{"id":293184,"date":"2025-11-18T18:59:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-18T18:59:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/293184\/"},"modified":"2025-11-18T18:59:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-18T18:59:07","slug":"teams-have-until-jan-2-to-sign-japanese-free-agent-rhp-imai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/293184\/","title":{"rendered":"Teams have until Jan. 2 to sign Japanese free-agent RHP Imai"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK — Right-hander Tatsuya Imai is entering Major League Baseball’s posting system and will be available to teams to sign as a free agent from Wednesday through Jan. 2.<\/p>\n

He joins power-hitting corner infielder Munetaka Murakami, whose 45-day window to sign expires Dec. 22.<\/p>\n

Tatsya Imai, a 27-year-old right-hander, went 10-5 with a 1.92 ERA this season with the Pacific League’s Seibu Lionsk, striking out178 batters in 163 2\/3 innings.\u00a0Sports Nippon\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

A 27-year-old right-hander, Imai went 10-5 with a 1.92 ERA this season with the Pacific League’s Seibu Lions. He struck out 178 batters in 163 2\/3 innings.<\/p>\n

Imai is 58-45 with a 3.15 ERA in eight seasons with Seibu, with 907 strikeouts in 963 2\/3 innings. He is a three-time All-Star.<\/p>\n

Imai pitched eight innings of a combined no-hitter against Fukuoka on April 18. He struck out 17 against Yokohama on June 17, breaking Daisuke Matsuzaka’s previous team record of 16 from 2004.<\/p>\n

Editor’s Picks<\/a><\/p>\n

Under MLB’s posting agreement with Nippon Professional Baseball, the posting fee would be 20% of the first $25 million of a major league contract, including earned bonuses and options. The percentage drops to 17.5% of the next $25 million and 15% of any amount over $50 million.<\/p>\n

There would be a supplemental fee of 15% of any earned bonuses, salary escalators and exercised options.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK — Right-hander Tatsuya Imai is entering Major League Baseball’s posting system and will be available to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":118094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,591,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-293184","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293184","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=293184"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293184\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/118094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=293184"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=293184"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=293184"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}