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March 15 in Japan may be tax day, but Dec. 2 was this year’s NPB axe day.

Few surprises on cut day

NPB teams published their offseason reserve lists on Monday when the only real surprise was that Yurisbel Gracial and Alfredo Despaigne were both released by the SoftBank Hawks, ostensibly because the team had yet to conclude its negotiations with the Cuban government’s sports authorities.

The bigger they are the softer they fall

The big local news was that Xavier Batista, who is under suspension for banned substances, was reserved by the Hiroshima Carp. This wasn’t really news since the Carp could have voided his contract for cause during the summer, and most certainly would have if he didn’t have value.

The severity of punishment in Japanese sports tends to decrease as the player’s value increases. Kento Momota, the world No. 2 men’s singles badminton player missed a year and the Rio Olympics after participating in illegal gambling. Kyosuke Takagi one of four Yomiuri Giants pitchers who admitted to betting on baseball, and the only one of the four who had any value, was fired and then re-hired a year after receiving a fairly lenient suspension. So Batista’s remaining with the Carp shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone.

Big Jay to join Marines

Jay Jackson said Tuesday he has completed his agreement to play for the Lotte Marines, while Lotte said their talks were moving in a good direction. I’m going to attribute that disparity to Japanese teams’ history of trying to control the timing of news about their team, and having other business to attend to — the introduction of free agent pitcher Manabu Mima.

The Kyodo News story is HERE.

Jackson, who has a child with his Japanese partner, had hoped to stay in NPB last season and was disappointed in the lack of offers. When nothing materialized he signed a minor league deal with the Brewers and pitched in 28 games with them and spoke about that situation in March and about his adjustments to Japanese ball.

His NPB page (Japanese language only) is HERE.

In the U.S. he struck out about 1.5 batters per inning this year — a vast improvement over his norm before he came to Japan in 2016, suggesting he learned how to get more strikeouts in Japan. It will be interesting to see how his re-acquaintance with American-style ball will affect his play here the second time around.

Yamaguchi, Kikuchi posting applications complete

The Hiroshima Carp have completed the posting application for second base glove wizard Ryosuke Kikuchi, while the Yomiuri Giants said they also completed the necessary paperwork on pitcher Shun Yamaguchi, meaning their 30-day posting period will commence on Tuesday, Dec. 3 at 8 a.m. Eastern time.

Here are Kyodo News’ English stories on Kikuchi and Yamaguchi.

Here’s my page for analysis and backstory on all the guys heading to the majors this winter and in winters to come.

Giants sign Brazilian flame thrower Vieiera

The Yomiuri Giants announced Tuesday they have signed 26-year-old Brazilian and White Sox farm hand Thyago Vieira, who has saved 14 Triple-A games over the past two seasons and pitched in 23 major league games.

Here’s Vieira’s MLB debut:

Another non-surprise this week was the Seibu Lions’ Tuesday announcement that the clulb had signed free agent right-hander Daisuke Matsuzaka, who returns to his old stomping grounds at the Lions’ MetLife Dome just outside Tokyo.

The Kyodo News English language story is HERE.

After spending his final two seasons in the big leagues with the New York Mets as a long reliever and occasional starter, Matsuzaka joined the SoftBank Hawks in 2015, but his body broke down soon after making his preseason debut at historic Koshien Stadium. He ended up pitching one game in 2016 as a test to see if he would be useful in the postseason and allowed five runs, two earned, in one inning.

When his three-year contract with SoftBank expired, he left under peculiar circumstances. The Hawks released him but apparently wanted to give him a significantly lower salary than it had taken to lure him away from the majors three years before.

The reason for that speculation is that only one team, the Chunichi Dragons, gave him a tryout. This is kind of an old story in NPB, and I’m uncertain why, but the Dragons are the go-to team for players that other NPB clubs would like to black ball.

They were the only team to offer a tryout to Norihiro Nakamura after he left Orix in a contract dispute after his injury-plagued 2006 season. Nakamura was signed to a developmental contract by Chunichi. Ten other teams took a pass on getting a guy for next to nothing who would play eight more pro seasons — including five more as a regular.

Matsuzaka’s English language NPB page is HERE.

Although Matsuzaka did not pitch really well in 2018, he was relatively effective and was given NPB’s Comeback Player of the Year Award. The gap between good and effective had to do with his getting big outs with runners on base. When he was able to locate his cutter, Matsuzaka was reasonably effective, complimenting that with his changeup.

His good fortune did a U-turn this year, when he suffered a shoulder injury due to a fan’s overenthusiastic high-five during a meet and great at the Dragons’ spring training camp in Okinawa. Other issues followed and Matsuzaka was limited to just 5-1/3 innings.

writing & research on Japanese baseball