LINK to the spreadsheet

This is a work in progress. I took a stab at where the Reds' 2013 Opening Day payroll stands right now. For the spreadsheet above, I've only considered the major league money the team is projected to pay-out: salaries, pro-rated bonuses and buyouts.

I've also estimated salaries for players who are eligible for arbitration and somewhat likely to still be in the organization. Any "bubble players" fall under the "other" category.

I've only considered players already in the organization - no speculative free agent signings of trades. In the case of the Ryans, only their buyouts are on ledger.

This isn't how I think things should be, per se, but it's a reasonable picture of next year based largely on how 2012 ended.

The Reds have a lot of raises coming through arbitration and long-term contracts, though it's worth mentioning that Brandon Phillips' salary actually takes a momentary down to $10M. The two biggest arbitration cases are probably Latos and Bailey, who are coming up for the first time. If Walt wants to extend Latos and/or Bailey, there may be a little bit of savings by back-loading their contracts.

There's also the matter of Leake, Heisey, Stubbs and Arredondo. They're all due for raises, but their future with the club is less clear. Each could conceivably be part of a trade - or series of trades - that allows the Reds to bring someone in without going over budget.