{"id":386333,"date":"2026-01-03T23:37:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T23:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/386333\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T23:37:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T23:37:08","slug":"why-kona-takahashi-reportedly-wont-sign-contract-in-mlb-free-agency-after-posting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/386333\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Kona Takahashi Reportedly Won’t Sign Contract In MLB Free Agency After Posting"},"content":{"rendered":"

Japanese right-hander Kona Takahashi will not be joining MLB in 2026 despite being posted<\/a> for clubs in November, MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand<\/a> reported Saturday.<\/p>\n

Takahashi will instead return to Nippon Professional Baseball on a multi-year deal with the Saitama Seibu Lions, per Feinsand.<\/p>\n

The contract includes opt-outs that could allow Takahashi to enter MLB unrestricted free agency next offseason, Feinsand reported.<\/p>\n

According to Feinsand, Takahashi received three offers from MLB clubs this offseason.<\/p>\n

The news of Takahashi’s return to NPB comes the day after his longtime teammate, right-hander Tatsuya Imai, signed<\/a> a three-year deal with the Houston Astros.<\/p>\n

Imai’s contract included $54 million in guaranteed money as well as opt-outs after every year on the deal, according to the New York Post’s Jon Heyman<\/a> and ESPN’s Jesse Rogers<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Feinsand<\/a> reported that Imai “had longer-term deals with lower AAVs on the table, per source, though he chose to go to Houston on the shorter-term, higher-AAV deal with opt outs.”<\/p>\n

That contract could allow Imai to potentially decide to test free agency next winter if he posts a strong debut MLB season with the Astros.<\/p>\n

Takahashi could be looking to similarly increase his future free agency value with a strong 2026 season in Japan.<\/p>\n

The right-hander posted<\/a> a 3.04 ERA through 24 starts and 148 innings last season, an improvement from the 3.87 ERA he recorded through 15 starts and 81.1 innings in 2024. <\/p>\n

He also sparked some concerns, however, by recording<\/a> a career-low 14.3 strikeout rate in 2025.<\/p>\n

Takahashi has yet to return to the standard he set in 2022 and 2023, however, during which he posted a sub-2.21 ERA and strikeout rate of at least 18 percent in consecutive seasons.<\/p>\n

A strong 2026 season could increase Takahashi’s free agency value, as could testing the market as a free agent rather than an NPB posting. MLB clubs who sign players posted by the Japanese league have to pay a fee<\/a> based on the size of their contract.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Japanese right-hander Kona Takahashi will not be joining MLB in 2026 despite being posted for clubs in November,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":386334,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[363,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-386333","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-mlb","9":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386333","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=386333"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/386333\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/386334"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=386333"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=386333"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=386333"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}