Japanese Pitcher Kikuchi Signs With Mariners

Some of the biggest Major League Baseball free agents have yet to sign with a team. Bryce Harper and Manny Machado are still on the market. One of the free agents who has attracted quite a bit of interest is Yusei Kikuchi. He is a star pitcher from the Seibu Lions of Nippon Professional Baseball. His situation is different than the other free agents who are currently available. He had a deadline of January 3 to come to an agreement with a team on a contract. Otherwise, he would have been returned to the Seibu Lions for the 2019 season. Fortunately, that did not happen. According to kyodonews.net, Kikuchi has signed a three-year contract with the Seattle Mariners that will pay him $43 million.

The Mariners have a rich history of signing players from Japan. In fact, they have always had at least one player born in Japan on their team for the past 20 seasons. They tried very hard last year to sign Shohei Ohtani. However, he eventually decided to sign with the Los Angeles Angels. Kikuchi has been scouted very heavily by the Mariners over the past few years in preparation for his eventual free agency. He is 26 games over .500 in his career in Japan. He also boasts an earned run average that is only 2.81. There are many baseball experts who think he will be an impact player very soon. He throws around 95 MPH and he has also been very durable.

The one thing that made many teams nervous about Kikuchi is the amount of pitches that he has thrown. This is a common complaint among Japanese pitchers who want to break into the Major Leagues. This is because teams in Japan do not limit their pitchers to a pitch count when they are young. This makes them a huge risk to get injured in the future. Obviously, teams to not want to fork over millions of dollars to a pitcher who will not be able to perform. The contract that was given to Yu Darvish by the Chicago Cubs last year is a warning to all teams that committing big bucks to Japanese pitchers is always a huge risk.

It remains to be seen how Kikuchi will do against the best hitters in the world. However, Shohei Ohtani impressed with his pitching abilities last season. Therefore, it would not be a shock if Kikuchi did the same thing.