The Royals "make a little more than a million dollars" with each home playoff game, and it is "pure profit, money the team did not put into" its '14 budget, according to Sam Mellinger of the K.C. STAR. Sources said that the Royals "made seven figures" for both the Wild Card Game against the A's and ALDS Game 3 against the Angels. With at least two ALCS home games against the Orioles, and potential World Series games to come, the Royals "could make more than" $10M that the club "hadn’t planned on earning." It is "critical that this unexpected windfall is reinvested into the team." Royals Owner David Glass "must give" GM Dayton Moore the "freedom to play next season with another franchise-record payroll." The team "made a small and calculated risk in playing this season" with a $92M payroll, and "simple math says they should be able to spend" $100M or more next year. That "would’ve been just the 17th-highest payroll in baseball this year, but it represents a remarkable rise for a team that played" the '11 season with a $36.1M payroll -- the "lowest in the majors that year." The money "will not change the Royals’ stature as one of baseball’s small-revenue organizations, but it could push them toward the middle third." The Royals "should be in a position to play the 2015 season with what would be the sixth franchise-record payroll in the nine years since Moore was hired." Sources said that the Royals "operate around a break-even point annually." Mellinger notes the club's "horrendous television contract," runs through '19. The Royals earn $20M or less from that deal each year, a "fraction of many teams" (K.C. STAR, 10/13).
