Cubs free agent target: Shota Imanaga

Shohei Ohtani is the top free agent in MLB this offseason. There are good reasons both pro and con to sign him; we covered that here last week.

The same is true for Yoshinobu Yamamoto. He’s really good! He will also be really expensive! (Yes, I know some of you don’t care about that. The Cubs care.) We’ve also talked about him.

Somewhat under the radar is another pitcher coming to MLB from NPB in Japan, lefthander Shota Imanaga. He’s 30 and has pitched eight years in NPB with a 3.18 ERA and 1.118 WHIP in 165 games. Imanaga’s baseball-reference page doesn’t break down how many of those are starts, but his inning total indicates he’s a starting pitcher. He also started the 2023 WBC championship game for Japan, allowing one run (a Trea Turner home run) in two innings. Overall he posted a 3.00 ERA (two runs in six innings) with no walks and seven strikeouts in the WBC.

MLB Trade Rumors has this to say about Imanaga:

MLBTR’s contacts have described Imanaga as a #3/4 starter in the majors. His fastball typically operates in the low-90s but he was working in the 94-96 MPH range in shorter stints during the WBC. Sources to whom MLBTR spoke indicated that Imanaga isn’t as highly regarded a pitcher as Mets righty Kodai Senga, who inked a five-year, $75MM contract last offseason.

Senga went on to have a fine year with the Mets. MLBTR says five years, $85 million for Imanaga, who is being posted by the Yokohama BayStars. Thus, any MLB team signing him will also owe the BayStars a posting fee, increasing the total amount spent (though the posting fee is not included in any MLB luxury tax calculation).

The Cubs could use another lefthander in the rotation. One really good thing about Imanaga is that he doesn’t walk guys. Since he returned from shoulder surgery after the 2020 season, Imanaga has walked just 79 batters in 411⅔ innings, or 1.7 per nine innings. He struck out 174 in 148 innings in 2023 for the BayStars.

Signing Imanaga would be sort of a backup plan for the Cubs if they can’t sign Ohtani, Yamamoto or Jordan Montgomery, three pitchers I’ve previously mentioned in this series (and yes, I still consider Ohtani a pitcher even though he won’t pitch in 2024).

The proposed MLBTR deal isn’t a bad one and if the Cubs can’t get any of the other pitchers here, I might do it.