{"id":503880,"date":"2026-01-03T11:05:22","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T11:05:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/503880\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T11:05:22","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T11:05:22","slug":"astros-rotation-prepared-for-competitive-spring-training-after-tatsuya-imai-deal-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/503880\/","title":{"rendered":"Astros’ rotation prepared for ‘competitive’ spring training after Tatsuya Imai deal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Astros’ rotation prepared for ‘competitive’ spring training after Tatsuya Imai deal<\/a> originally appeared on The Sporting News<\/a>. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Houston Astros<\/a> won the bidding war for Japanese ace Tatsuya Imai, who signed a three-year, $63 million contract <\/a>on Thursday.<\/p>\n

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Imai’s signing will help the Astros round out their rotation, but there’s still plenty of work to be done. Spring training will help manager Joe Espada decide who will follow Hunter Brown as the No. 2 arm.<\/p>\n

Cristian Javier should be the top candidate to earn the spot, with Mike Burrows, acquired from the Pittsburgh Pirates<\/a>, as another option. How will the rest of Houston’s rotation take shape?<\/p>\n

The Astros have a few decisions to make<\/p>\n

The Athletic’s Chandler Rome<\/a> pointed out on Friday that, despite Imai being one of the offseason’s hottest topics, there is “skepticism” among clubs that he is an MLB-level ace.<\/p>\n

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“The contract he received is indicative of skepticism within the industry of how Imai\u2019s game will translate to MLB, though few have questioned the upside Imai brings,” wrote Rome.<\/p>\n

He added that the Astros have several pitchers whose role with the team will be determined during spring training. Houston could opt to use a six-man rotation to begin the season.<\/p>\n

“The Astros open the season by playing 25 games in 27 days, which is conducive to the six-man rotation Houston carried at similar points last season,” Rome wrote.<\/p>\n

“That means [Ryan] Weiss, Spencer Arrighetti, Lance McCullers Jr., Nate Pearson, Colton Gordon, Jason Alexander and AJ Blubaugh could be battling for two remaining spots.”<\/p>\n

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More Astros News:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Astros’ rotation prepared for ‘competitive’ spring training after Tatsuya Imai deal originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2389],"tags":[31009,42,5,23164,10267,6175,139,54,3211,1328,11838,5918,1484,363,4,878,64,5749,4678,151,4658],"class_list":["post-503880","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-houston-astros","tag-aj-blubaugh","tag-astros","tag-baseball","tag-chandler-rome","tag-colton-gordon","tag-cristian-javier","tag-houston","tag-houston-astros","tag-houstonastros","tag-hunter-brown","tag-jason-alexander","tag-joe-espada","tag-lance-mccullers-jr","tag-mike-burrows","tag-mlb","tag-nate-pearson","tag-pittsburgh-pirates","tag-rotation","tag-spencer-arrighetti","tag-spring-training","tag-tatsuya-imai"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/115830844509978262","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503880","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=503880"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503880\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}