Roki Sasaki may be under contract with an MLB team next season, two years before he and the Lotte Marines are eligible to cash in on the riches that would be theirs if he moved as an international free agent, instead of as an international amateur, as defined by MLB’s collective bargaining agreement with its players union.
I have spoken to people with some knowledge of the situation, and have a good idea where the leak occurred that Sasaki will be posted. But I am not here to tell you that he will or he won’t. Even if the Marines agree to let him go, the final decision would be Sasaki’s, not his agent’s and not the sports marketing company that has a stake in him.
Instead, I want to explain how it might take place.
On Friday, we got a double-barreled dose of the American exceptionalism that MLB promotes wholeheartedly.
A day before the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres opened Game 1 of their NLDS, Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto were asked about their feelings ahead of their “first” postseason games.
Ohtani, who came to MLB as a sixth-year pro and a former MVP, was a veteran of 13 major league postseason games between the ages of 19 and 21. In those, he went 2-2 with one save in five games as a pitcher with 29 strikeouts and a 4.38 ERA. During those years, as a part-time DH, Ohtani slashed .262/.311/.381 with one RBI.
Asked if he felt pressure ahead of his first postseason game, Ohtani said, “Nope.”
