[alnorth]

Apparently the Yankees plan to blow through the $2-2.5MM limit on bonuses for international players (mostly 15-16 year olds), and spend somewhere around $15MM on them next offseason, because it won't impact their goal to get under $189MM on payroll, and the penalties for blowing through the cap on draft bonuses are too steep.

If they do that, they will pay a 100% tax on those international bonuses, and they will be prohibited from giving any international player more than a $300k bonus for 2 years, so they'd really need to make it count. (If MLB chooses to go to an international draft in 2015, then the penalty will change to forfeiting their 1st round pick for 2 years)