{"id":503287,"date":"2026-01-02T22:12:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-02T22:12:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/503287\/"},"modified":"2026-01-02T22:12:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T22:12:13","slug":"right-hander-tatsuya-imai-and-houston-astros-finalize-54-million-3-year-contract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/503287\/","title":{"rendered":"Right-hander Tatsuya Imai and Houston Astros finalize $54 million, 3-year contract"},"content":{"rendered":"

HOUSTON (AP) \u2014 Right-hander Tatsuya Imai and the Houston Astros finalized their $54 million, three-year contract on Friday.<\/p>\n

Houston opened a roster spot by designating right-hander Kaleb Ort for assignment.<\/p>\n

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Imai gets a $2 million signing bonus and salaries of $16 million this year and $18 million in each of the next two seasons.<\/p>\n

Based on his 2026 performance, his 2027 salary would escalate by $2 million each for 80, 90 and 100 innings, and his 2028 salary by $1 million for each level.<\/p>\n

If he doesn\u2019t pitch 80 innings in 2026 and does in 2027, his 2028 salary would rise by $1 million. If he doesn\u2019t pitch 90 innings in 2026 and does in 2027, his 2028 salary would increase by another $1 million. And if he doesn\u2019t pitch 100 innings in 2026 and does in 2027, his 2028 salary also would increase by another $1 million.<\/p>\n

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Imai can opt out after the 2026 and 2027 seasons.<\/p>\n

Imai receives the third-highest average annual value for a Japanese pitcher entering Major League Baseball behind Yoshinobu Yamamoto\u2019s $27.08 million with the Los Angeles Dodgers<\/a> in a deal that started in 2024 and Masahiro Tanaka\u2019s $22.14 million with the New York Yankees<\/a> in a contract that ran from 2014-20.<\/p>\n

A 27-year-old righty, Imai went 10-5 with a 1.92 ERA last season for the Pacific League\u2019s Seibu Lions. He struck out 178 batters in 163 2\/3 innings.<\/p>\n

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Imai is 58-45 with a 3.15 ERA in eight seasons with Seibu, with 907 strikeouts in 963 2\/3 innings. He is a three-time All-Star.<\/p>\n

Imai pitched eight innings of a combined no-hitter against Fukuoka on April 18. He struck out 17 against Yokohama on June 17, breaking Daisuke Matsuzaka\u2019s previous team record of 16 from 2004.<\/p>\n

Under MLB\u2019s posting agreement with Nippon Professional Baseball, Seibu will get a posting fee of $9.675 million from the Astros and a supplemental fee of 15% of any earned bonuses, salary escalators and exercised options.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON (AP) \u2014 Right-hander Tatsuya Imai and the Houston Astros finalized their $54 million, three-year contract on Friday.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":503288,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2389],"tags":[42,5,46520,139,54,3211,857,3947,4,62,4658,1791,313],"class_list":{"0":"post-503287","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston-astros","8":"tag-astros","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-daisuke-matsuzaka","11":"tag-houston","12":"tag-houston-astros","13":"tag-houstonastros","14":"tag-kaleb-ort","15":"tag-masahiro-tanaka","16":"tag-mlb","17":"tag-new-york-yankees","18":"tag-tatsuya-imai","19":"tag-the-los-angeles-dodgers","20":"tag-yoshinobu-yamamoto"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115827805003723559","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503287","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=503287"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503287\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/503288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503287"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503287"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503287"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}