The Yoshinobu Yamamoto transfer saga is finally over. It was an urgent 48 hours.
Jack Curry, a commentator for the New York Yankees’ YES Network, first broke the news on the 22nd (KST), saying, “I heard that Yamamoto will sign with the Dodgers for over $300 million.” Major League Baseball sources then confirmed the deal.
Representative sources from Major League Baseball then reported Yamamoto’s move to the Dodgers. Later, ESPN reporter Jeff Passan added that Yamamoto’s contract with the Dodgers was for 12 years and $325 million (about 42.3 billion won). It includes a $50 million (651 million won) signing bonus and an opt-out clause. The specific timing of the opt-out was not disclosed. Furthermore, deferred payments like Shohei Otani’s are not uncommon.
Yamamoto’s record-breaking contract is the highest ever for a Japanese player. The previous record was held by Masahiro Tanaka’s seven-year, $155 million (KRW 2019 billion) deal with the New York Yankees in 2014. Both the length and amount of the contract are the highest ever for a Major League Baseball pitcher. The previous record was nine years and $324 million for this year’s American League Cy Young Award winner, Gerrit Cole, with the New York Yankees in 2020. 바카라사이트 He became the highest-paid pitcher of all time without throwing a single pitch in the major leagues.
Yamamoto’s original team, the Orix Buffaloes, who won three consecutive Pacific League championships with him, also got a big payday.
Under the US-Japan Players’ Agreement, Yamamoto’s contract is worth $50.62 million (approximately KRW 65.9 billion). It’s the highest in the history of the current system.
Yamamoto won four Pacific League titles (wins, ERA, strikeouts, and winning percentage) and three consecutive MVPs. In 172 career games (897 innings) with the Orix Buffaloes, he went 70-29 with a 1.82 ERA. In 2021, he went 18-5 with a 1.39 ERA in 26 games (193⅔ innings) and struck out 206 batters to win his first four pitcher’s crowns and earn his first Pacific League MVP.
Last year, he went 15-5 with a 1.68 ERA in 26 games (193 innings) and struck out 205 batters, and this year he was even stronger, going 16-6 with a 1.23 ERA in 23 games (164 innings) and striking out 169 batters.Winning four titles in three consecutive years is a first in Japanese professional baseball. He was the best pitcher in Japan, winning the Sawamura Award three years in a row and the league MVP three times.
After this year’s Japan Series, his original club, the Orix, approved Yamamoto’s posting and opened negotiations. The search lasted about a month and generated a lot of rumors, but the decision was delayed.
The bidding for Yamamoto began this week.
The San Francisco Giants, Boston Red Sox, and others were rumored to have offered $300 million, but ESPN’s Jeff Passan reported on April 19 that “Yamamoto’s agent, Joel Sherman, has asked the teams not to discuss terms yet. Negotiations are just beginning,” he said.
After the news of Yamamoto’s deal broke, “48 hours before the Dodgers offered, the New York Mets offered a deal similar to the Dodgers’, and the Yankees offered $300 million,” ESPN reported, “Philadelphia, San Francisco, Boston and Toronto also made bids, but none of them were able to beat the Dodgers’ offer, which accounted for more than half of all major league spending in free agency this winter.
The Mets and Yankees made the first aggressive bids, and then the Dodgers hesitated, offering the same size contract as the Mets. In the end, the Dodgers won out.
New York outlet SNY also reported, “The bidding heated up, with the Mets starting at $200 million and moving up to $325 million, according to league sources. The Yankees then offered 10 years and $300 million,” explaining that “Yamamoto was seeking opt-out clauses after the fifth and eighth years, making the deal more palatable to the Mets, which would have been a five-year deal if Yamamoto was healthy and efficient.”The Mets had all their ducks in a row, but were ultimately outbid by the Dodgers. Billionaire owner Steve Cohen and general manager David Stearns flew to Japan to meet with Yamamoto, and Cohen even invited him to his mansion in Connecticut. But all of these efforts came to naught. “The Mets were not in a favorable position to sign them,” SNY said.
The conditions were in place to make them a preferred destination, but the timing of this free agency was wrong.
“In fact, according to one source, the two finalists for Yamamoto were the Yankees and Dodgers,” SNY continued, noting that the Mets were not among the finalists. ‘The Yankees wanted to acquire a pitcher, but they weren’t as desperate as they were to trade Juan Soto,’ the outlet said. When Hal Steinbrenner and Brian Cashman think a player is essential, they never deny it. “The Yankees wanted Yamamoto and were aggressive in their bidding, but they didn’t want to get into a bidding war with the Dodgers and Mets,” said Hal Steinbrenner, who has been involved with Gerrit Cole in 2019, Aaron Judge in 2022 and Soto, who was acquired last month.
The Dodgers signaled their spending spree this winter by signing Shohei Ohtani to a 10-year, $700 million contract. Notably, Ohtani agreed to a deferred payment deal that will see him receive only $20 million of the 10-year, $700 million contract, with the remaining $680 million coming after 10 years. Fearing that his massive contract would deter the Dodgers from investing in him to fulfill his desire to win a championship, Ohtani offered the deferral first, 사설토토 and the Dodgers agreed. Ohtani was joined in negotiations with Yamamoto by Dodger superstars including Mookie Betts, Freddie Freeman, and Will Smith, and convinced Yamamoto to play with him.
After playing together at the World Baseball Classic (WBC), Ohtani convinced Yamamoto to accept the Dodgers’ offer.
The Dodgers, freed from the burden of a hefty luxury tax thanks to Ohtani’s “big decision,” acquired hard-throwing starter Tyler Glasnow from the Tampa Bay Rays in a trade. The Dodgers lived up to Ohtani’s expectations by signing him to a five-year, $136.5 million extension and later locking up Yamamoto with the highest contract ever for a pitcher. In total, the Dodgers have invested $1.161 billion, or $1.5 trillion, in just three players: Ohtani, Glassnow, and Yamamoto.