This story was excerpted from Jordan Bastian’s Cubs Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.
CHICAGO — One of the goals Cubs president of baseball operations Jed Hoyer has maintained during his tenure has been to establish his ballclub as an attractive landing spot for players coming to the Major Leagues from Japan.
Two of the Cubs’ current core pieces hail from Japan — left-hander Shota Imanaga and outfielder Seiya Suzuki — and Chicago convinced Yu Darvish to sign in free agency prior to the 2018 season. Those successful recruitments certainly do not hurt when it comes to the Cubs’ potential pitch to Japanese pitching phenom Roki Sasaki, who is expected to be posted by the Chiba Lotte Marines this winter.
More on Sasaki:
- Sasaki coming to MLB next season
- Everything to know about Sasaki
- Where does Sasaki rank among top free agents?
- Where will he rank on Top 100 Prospects list?
- Will Sasaki join Ohtani and Yamamoto in LA?
- MLB teams begin the chase to sign Sasaki
- Details on Japanese posting system
“We’ve worked really hard to, I would say, do a good job with the assimilation process for Japanese players,” Hoyer said at the General Managers’ Meetings in San Antonio last week. “I would expect that, in the Japanese market, the Cubs and Chicago are really appealing.”
During the Cubs’ pursuit of Suzuki ahead of the 2022 season, he met with Darvish in San Diego to discuss his options. Even though the pitcher had been traded away by the Cubs prior to the ‘21 campaign, he raved about the organization, city and Cubs fans. Suzuki went on to sign a five-year, $85 million contract with Chicago.
Last offseason, the Cubs signed Imanaga to a four-year, $53 million contract in free agency and he turned in a performance (15-3 with a 2.91 ERA) that should merit votes in both the National League Rookie of the Year and Cy Young races. That continued Japan’s strong pitching pipeline to the Majors (along with Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Kodai Senga, Yusei Kikuchi and two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani, among others, in recent years).
“I don’t expect that to slow down,” Hoyer said of Japan’s pitching talent. “I think that pitchers are going to continue to come over and have success. Watching Yamamoto in the World Series, obviously the year that Shota had, Senga a year ago — there’s really recent success stories, and I think the market knows that.”
The Sasaki situation is different from the Cubs’ targeting of Suzuki, Imanaga or even Darvish (six years, $126 million) in that this goes beyond making a large free-agent bid. This upcoming saga will be more like Ohtani’s arrival in 2017, when he signed with the Angels at 23 years old for a $2.3 million bonus and was under control for six years before free agency. The Cubs made their pitch to Ohtani back then, too.
At 23 years old, Sasaki will be eligible to be signed as an international amateur free agent, meaning his deal will be capped financially by the collectively-bargained guidelines. And the timing of the pitcher’s posting will then determine whether his deal will fall under the 2024 signing period (ending on Dec. 15) or the ‘25 signing period (beginning Jan. 15). Once posted, teams will have a 45-day negotiating window to sign Sasaki to a Minor League contract.
As MLB.com Pipeline expert Jonathan Mayo broke down in a detailed piece examining the Sasaki situation, the Cubs currently have $237,200 (15th in MLB) left in their ’24 international bonus pool, compared to $6,261,600 currently allotted for ’25. At present, the Dodgers ($2,502,500) and Orioles (2,147,300) have the most funds left in the ’24 period. In ’25, seven teams are in the top tier for pool money ($7,555,500).
The Cubs have scouted Sasaki in Japan and Hoyer has made yearly trips overseas to see players in person as well. The righty makes sense as a Chicago target not only given the team’s desire to add rotation help this winter, but also due to the cost-effective nature of the deal and the fact that he will be under control through 2030.
Sasaki has a fastball that can reach triple digits and offsets the pitch with a splitter and slider. As a high schooler, he grabbed headlines with a 194-pitch, 21-strikeout, 12-inning complete game in a high-profile tournament. In ‘22, he twirled a 19-strikeout perfect game. Over four years with Lotte, Sasaki has logged a 2.10 ERA with 11.5 strikeouts per nine innings (394 2/3 frames)With Ohtani, Yamamoto and the ’24 World Series trophy in hand, the Dodgers are considered a top contender for Sasaki. The Cubs — who open the ’25 season against L.A. on March 18-19 in Tokyo — can hope that having Suzuki and Imanaga helps their cause. Plenty of teams will be vying for the star pitcher in what should be a fascinating storyline in the coming weeks.
