Entering the season, Homer Bailey was an afterthought. After four years of struggling with injuries and ineffectiveness, the Reds traded him to the Dodgers in a salary dump, at which point L.A. released him. The Dodgers are paying him more than $22 million to not pitch for them, and this spring he wound up signing a minor league contract with the rebuilding Royals.
Since then, Bailey has bounced back in a big way. He turned in a league-average performance in 18 starts for Kansas City, which was already a big step up from what he’d done the previous few years, and that work earned him a trade to a contender in July.