The Posting of Roki Sasaki

The Los Angeles Dodgers have been watching the career of Roki Sasaki for some time now. With the current signing of Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Shohei Ohtani, it seems like Roki Sasaki is contemplating coming out early.

Roki Sasaki is a 22-year-old right-handed starter, drafted in 2019 by the Chiba Lotte Marines and made his debut in the NPB in 2021. In his first full year in the Marines’ rotation, Sasaki recorded a 2.20 ERA and 1.70 FIP, striking out 35.3% of hitters while walking just 4.7% in 129 1/3 innings. Sasaki became the 16th pitcher in the history of NPB to pitch a perfect game last April and followed up the performance by throwing eight more perfect innings in his next outing, before getting pulled with 102 pitches. In the 17 perfect innings, Sasaki struck out 33 of the 51 batters faced. Sasaki has a three-pitch mix, a fastball that averages between 99-101mph and tops out at 104mph, a devastating splitter, and a slider.

Roki Sasaki is entering his third full year in the NPB and could be available for posting at the end of the 2024 season. According to the current posting rules and MLB collective bargaining agreement, Sasaki would be viewed as an international amateur and eligible to enter MLB on a minor league contract with a signing bonus.

How it works:

Players who are classified as “professionals” a foreign-player must be at least 25-years old and have at least six seasons of experience in the NPB before they can become an oversees free agent. Yoshinobu Yamamoto met the requirements and signed as a free agent to a 12-year $325 million dollar contract with the Los Angles Dodgers.

Players are posted from November first to December fifth, both the team and player must agree on the posting. An NPB team notifies the MLB Commissioner of a posting, with the posting fee determined by the value of the contract that a posted player eventually signs with an MLB organization. Once the MLB Commissioner announces the posting, the player has 30 days to sign with an MLB team. Unlike the past system, in which only the team that won the bidding process had negotiating rights, the current system allows the posted player to negotiate with any MLB team willing to pay the posting fee. If the player signs with an MLB team during the negotiating window, the signing team will pay the posting fee.

For players signed to MLB contracts, the posting fee is based on the amount of guaranteed money in the initial contract:

20% of the first $25 million
17.5% of the next $25 million
15% of any amount above $50 million

For players signed to minor-league contracts, the fee is a flat 25% of the contract’s value.

If Sasaki is not 25 years old and has played in NPB for at least six seasons, a deal for him would be counted toward the international bonus money restrictions. Under the new CBA, teams have at least $4.75 million to spend. Those with a Competitive Balance Round A receive $5.25 million and those with a Competitive Balance Round B pick receive $5.75 million. Bonus pool money can be traded up to a maximum of roughly $10.1 million, per MLB.

With all that, you can see how difficult this will be for Chiba Lotte Marines to agree with Roki Sasaki on being posted early. The Marines will lose millions in posting fees if Roki Sasaki is posted at the end of the 2024 season.

For Dodgers Daily, I’m Mike Salas