Touching Base: Yoshida, Senga, Fujinami and more international updates, posting system explainer

Kodai Senga of the SoftBank Hawks pitches in Game 1 of the Japan Series against the Yomiuri Giants at Kyocera Dome in Osaka on Nov. 21, 2020. (Kyodo via AP Images) ==Kyodo
By Nick Groke
Dec 15, 2022

Touching Base is a monthly column highlighting the exciting happenings in baseball beyond the borders of MLB — from international leagues to amateur teams and everything in between. This month’s column will touch on international free-agent updates, how the NPB posting system works, a fracas in the Venezuelan Winter League and a preview of what’s to come with the World Baseball Classic.

A rush of movement between Nippon Professional Baseball, the top league in Japan, and Major League Baseball saw stateside teams spend more than $180 million on players new to the majors this month and more is still to come. And it’s probably not a coincidence.

The Boston Red Sox opened a season of spending by adding outfielder Masataka Yoshida, the best hitter in NPB, with a five-year, $90 million deal that also cost Boston a $15.4 million fee to Yoshida’s posting team, the Orix Buffaloes. The New York Mets then followed by signing right-hander Kodai Senga to a five-year, $75 million contract. Senga’s deal didn’t include a posting fee because he had played the full nine seasons in NPB required to leave the league and was a free-and-clear free agent.

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Any day now, flame-throwing Shintaro Fujinami will probably sign in MLB, with several teams reportedly chasing the right-hander, including the Arizona Diamondbacks, San Francisco Giants and Red Sox. Like Yoshida, his signing would require a fee paid to his posting team, the Hanshin Tigers.

Three notable signings from Japan in one winter stand as a kind of bonanza. Even before a potential Fujinami signing, this has been the most expensive influx of players from Asia into MLB in a single offseason, surpassing 2015, when Kenta Maeda signed an incentive-heavy eight-year deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers that sent a $20 million fee to the Hiroshima Toyo Carp and Byung-ho Park went to the Minnesota Twins on a four-year, $16 million deal that included nearly $13 million to the then-Nexen Heroes.

If Fujinami does sign with an MLB team, that would make three notable additions — and a 60 percent jump in the number of Japanese players in MLB. As of last month, there are just five active Japanese players in MLB, led by Los Angeles Angels superstar Shohei Ohtani, along with Yu Darvish (San Diego Padres), Kenta Maeda (Twins), Yusei Kikuchi (Toronto Blue Jays) and Seiya Suzuki (Chicago Cubs).

So why the sudden rush? Several factors seem to be at play.

A year ago, MLB was stuck in a drawn-out fight with the players union over a collective bargaining agreement, a logjam that didn’t resolve until March. By then, the NPB was prepping for Opening Day. The top leagues in Korea and Taiwan were also well into their spring trainings, so the risk of waiting for MLB to finalize a new CBA was too great. Two players last winter were posted for MLB but didn’t sign with a team. Suzuki was the only player who did, but like most top free agents last winter, he probably had a good sense of his demand in the market before the lockout.

 Masataka Yoshida signed a five-year, $90 million deal with the Red Sox last week. (Koji Watanabe / Getty Images)

Another factor: MLB owners seem to be in a spending mood, with nearly $3 billion already doled out in free agency this winter. The Red Sox didn’t balk at spending more than $100 million on a still-unproven Yoshida. The Mets jumped at paying for Senga — but then again, they are the most free-wheeling spenders in the majors right now.

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But, as teams came out of the pandemic shutdown two years ago, many owners and baseball operations bosses talked about a period of retrenchment on player payroll budgets, while trying to make up for a mostly lost season in 2020. Those reins now seem to be off for many teams.

Of course, some risk remains. Three other players from Japan who played in MLB last year, including ex-Tampa Bay Rays, Los Angeles Dodgers and Pittsburgh Pirates infielder Yoshi Tsutsugo, are now free agents.

The Red Sox were criticized for reportedly paying over the market asking price on Yoshida, with some evaluators questioning whether his power will play in North America. But unless a team is bumping its head on a hard, self-imposed salary ceiling, what does that matter? It’s not your money being spent.

It’s possible Yoshida doesn’t hit for the same type of power numbers this season after knocking 21 homers in NPB last year. Suzuki came to the Cubs after hitting 38 homers for the Carp in 2021, then followed by hitting 14 for Chicago last year. But even then, Yoshida has an elite eye at the plate. He slashed .335/.447/.561 last season and he’s walked more than he’s struck out in each of the past four seasons. Adam Jones called him the “Japanese Juan Soto” for a reason.

One more possible reason for a river of movement from NPB to MLB? The league reportedly changed its rules this season to allow teams a bigger window to sign transferring players, from 30 days to 45. So Fujinama, the only posted player currently unsigned, has until Jan. 20 to work a deal with an MLB team.

Let’s remember some guys

The last big influx of players from Japan to MLB came in the early aughts. In a two-year span, starting in 2002, two eventual NPB Hall of Famers, Hideki Matsui and Shingo Takatsu, signed with the New York Yankees and Chicago White Sox, respectively. With them, infielder Kaz Matsui went to the Mets, right-hander Akinori Otsuka landed with the Padres, outfielder So Taguchi went to the St. Louis Cardinals and lefty Kazuhisa Ishii signed with the Dodgers.

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How does the posting system work?

MLB came to an agreement with NPB in 1998 after an awkward situation with Hideo Nomo exiting NPB to sign with the Dodgers. (MLB came to a similar agreement with the KBO League in 2012). In short, Nomo kind of feigned retirement to get out of his NPB contract, then suddenly made a comeback with Los Angeles.

NPB wanted to protect its league from MLB signing away all its best players. And it worked. The posting system forced Ichiro Suzuki to wait until 2000 to sign with the Seattle Mariners. Suzuki was one of the first players who made the jump by following the inter-league agreement.

NPB players can be posted for their availability as late as Dec. 5. If an MLB team wants to sign a posted player, they would owe his current team a percentage of his contract. That percentage has changed over time as rules were modified, and now follows a complicated step system based on how much the player will earn on his new MLB team.

Of course, other arrangements can be made, too. Munetaka Murakami, the 22-year-old Yakult Swallows slugger who broke Sadaharu Oh’s single-season homer record with 56 last season, signed a new three-year deal that includes a posting opt-out. Murakami had it stipulated in his contract that he will be posted to MLB after the 2025 season. Normally, he’d have had to wait until after the 2027 season.

So why would an NPB team agree to allow one of their best players to leave? They wouldn’t unless the player requested a move and, if that player performed well over time, his team agrees to it as a kind of reward. And, of course, that team earns a posting fee that is not insignificant. Ken Rosenthal talked about this in a recent episode of The Athletic Baseball Show.

Rumble in the VWL

In case you somehow missed it, this happened in the Venezuelan Winter League last month:

Some background: That home-run hitter is Carlos Castro of Tiburones de La Guaira, a former Atlanta Braves farmhand who played for the Kentucky Genomes and Long Island Ducks in Independent ball last season. A nice-looking swing. The slow walk and bat flip don’t seem too outrageous, in the grand scheme of things. But he is staring down the opposing dugout of Caribes de Anzoátegui.

go-deeper

GO DEEPER

Standout baseball performances from around the world in 2022

So then we see former New York Mets infielder Asdrúbal Cabrera, now playing for Caribes, clothesline Castro to the dirt. It sparked a true melee, with players from both teams emptying onto the field.

That’s not all. At one point, the pitcher, Edubray Ramos, responded with more than fisticuffs.

When the flames were finally snuffed, Cabrera was suspended 35 games by the league and Ramos was hit with a 40-game suspension. Both of their seasons are over.

Cabrera is certainly comfortable with the idea of bat flips. In 2016, he unleashed a two-handed fling after hitting a game-winning three-run homer in the 11th inning for the Mets.

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Interesting twist: That Cabrera homer for the Mets in 2016? He hit it off the aforementioned Ramos.

Ergonomic update

How do you say it?

If you end up at a holiday party cornered by an obnoxious stranger, there’s a Spanish baseballism that might come in handy. Similar to how baseball phrases have crossed over into common English parlance — like how “a home run” means success or “striking out” equates to failure — a certain Spanish phrase has, too.

Ni pichas, ni cachas, ni dejas batear.

It translates literally as “no pitch, no catch, no bat,” but it refers to a good-for-nothing schlub. Kind of a Charlie Brown type. Have fun on Slack with that, if you want.

World Baseball Classic coming soon

The first games are set to start on March 8 in Taiwan, with a group that includes Cuba, Chinese Taipei, Panama, Netherlands and Italy. While we’re still waiting for many teams to announce their rosters, Team USA is filling up quickly. Ex-Yomiuri Giants standout and current St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Miles Mikolas was among the most recent to commit.

We’ll have much more on the WBC at The Athletic in the future, along with a bigger update from the Winter Leagues in the coming days.

Have anything you’d like to see covered in future columns? Let us know in the comments below. Your recent suggestions were much appreciated and definitely noted.

(Top photo of Kodai Senga in 2020: Kyodo via Associated Press)

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