{"id":379142,"date":"2025-12-31T04:29:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-31T04:29:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/379142\/"},"modified":"2025-12-31T04:29:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-31T04:29:07","slug":"tatsuya-imai-meeting-with-teams-before-fridays-deadline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/379142\/","title":{"rendered":"Tatsuya Imai Meeting With Teams Before Friday’s Deadline"},"content":{"rendered":"

The next couple days will see at least two big-ticket free agents come off the board. Japanese stars\u00a0Tatsuya Imai<\/a> and\u00a0Kazuma Okamoto<\/a> are nearing the end of their respective 45-day posting windows. Imai has until Friday at 4:00 pm Central to sign; Okamoto\u2019s contract must be finalized by the same time on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Reporting out of Japan over the weekend revealed that Okamoto was traveling to the U.S. for a final round of in-person meetings<\/a>. Imai is evidently doing the same. Katie Woo and Will Sammon of The Athletic<\/a> wrote last night that Imai had spoken with multiple teams and would continue to do so throughout the week. Mark Feinsand of MLB.com relays that Imai and Okamoto \u2014 both of whom are represented by the Boras Corporation \u2014 are conducting in-person interviews in Los Angeles (link via MLB.com\u2019s Brian Murphy<\/a>). Scott Boras is based out of Southern California, so the location of the meetings shouldn\u2019t be viewed as an indication that the Dodgers or Angels are favorites.<\/p>\n

Imai has been publicly tied to the Yankees, Mets, Cubs, Phillies and Orioles since his posting period began. While a recent Yahoo! Japan article<\/a> listed the White Sox as another possibility, MLB.com\u2019s report downplays the likelihood of the White Sox landing the right-hander. Chicago shockingly added<\/a> Munetaka Murakami<\/a> last week, but that only came after the slugger\u2019s market cratered because of concerns about his strikeout rate. Murakami wound up settling for a two-year, $34MM contract. Imai is expected to do far better given the cost of high-upside starting pitching.<\/p>\n

The 5\u201911\u201d righty has been one of Japan\u2019s best pitchers over the past two seasons. He\u2019s coming off a 1.92 ERA showing with 178 strikeouts across 163 2\/3 innings. Imai has an NPB-best 27% strikeout rate since the start of 2024. He sits in the mid-90s with a promising slider. Command was an issue earlier in his career, but his strike-throwing has progressed as he has gained experience. This past season\u2019s 7% walk rate was a personal low and better than the MLB average.<\/p>\n

Imai is headed into his age-28 season. His contract needs to be finalized by Friday, so it\u2019s likely he\u2019ll agree to terms by tomorrow or Thursday. That\u2019d leave time for a standard physical. The team that signs him will owe a posting fee to the Seibu Lions. That\u2019s proportional to the contract value: 20% of the first $25MM, 17.5% of the next $25MM, and 15% of all further spending.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The next couple days will see at least two big-ticket free agents come off the board. Japanese stars\u00a0Tatsuya…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":379143,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[133757,363,99,149619],"class_list":{"0":"post-379142","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-kazuma-okamoto","9":"tag-mlb","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tatsuya-imai"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=379142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/379143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=379142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=379142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=379142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}