{"id":623542,"date":"2026-03-14T14:35:40","date_gmt":"2026-03-14T14:35:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/623542\/"},"modified":"2026-03-14T14:35:40","modified_gmt":"2026-03-14T14:35:40","slug":"hiromi-itoh-teruaki-sato-expected-to-be-posted-for-mlb-teams-next-winter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/623542\/","title":{"rendered":"Hiromi Itoh, Teruaki Sato Expected To Be Posted For MLB Teams Next Winter"},"content":{"rendered":"

MLB teams believe Nippon Professional Baseball stars Hiromi Itoh<\/a> and Teruaki Sato<\/a> will both be posted into next offseason\u2019s free agent market, according to ESPN.com\u2019s Jorge Castillo<\/a>.\u00a0 Itoh is a right-handed pitcher for the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters, while Sato is a slugging third baseman\/outfielder for the Hanshin Tigers.\u00a0 Both are members of\u00a0 Japan\u2019s World Baseball Classic team, who square off with Venezuela today in a quarter-final matchup in Miami.<\/p>\n

Itoh turns 29 in August, and the righty has a 2.87 ERA, 21.73% strikeout rate, and 6.17% walk rate over 828 career innings with the Fighters from 2021-25.\u00a0 He is the reigning winner of the Sawamura Award, which is somewhat akin to the Cy Young Award except it is only given to a sole NPB pitcher (not one each from the Central and Pacific Leagues) and it isn\u2019t awarded every year if no pitchers are deemed worthy of the honor.<\/p>\n

Big league pitching coaches might well be intrigued by delving into Itoh\u2019s seven-pitch arsenal, which is highlighted by a fastball that has hit 96mph.\u00a0 Castillo writes that Itoh\u2019s primary pitches amidst his seven offerings are the fastball, a splitter, and a sweeper.<\/p>\n

The fairly modest strikeout rate could be a bit of a red flag for Major League teams, plus Itoh is relatively short at only 5\u20199\u2033.\u00a0 Still, a talent evaluator for an American League team tells Castillo that while Itoh is \u201csmallish,\u201d he has a \u201cproven track record of durability.\u00a0 He should continue to strike out MLB hitters while allowing very few walks.\u201d<\/p>\n

Castillo names Sonny Gray<\/a> as a comp for Itoh, while Ryan O\u2019Hearn<\/a> is the comp for Sato.\u00a0 The Hanshin slugger just celebrated his 27th birthday yesterday, and is coming off a 2025 season that saw him hit .277\/.345\/.579 over 597 plate appearances while bopping a career-high 40 home runs.\u00a0 This huge year earned him Central League MVP honors, plus his fourth All-Star nod in his five NPB seasons.<\/p>\n

Sato\u2019s resume also includes a Gold Glove for his work at third base, which has been Sato\u2019s primary position over the last three seasons.\u00a0 He played a good deal of right field in 2021-22 and also got some work back in the outfield this past season, so Major League teams could view Sato as a versatile player able to capably toggle between the two positions, if he isn\u2019t just kept at third base.<\/p>\n

Since both Itoh and Sato are well short of the nine full years of NPB service to achieve full free agency, the Fighters and Tigers would have to agree to make an earlier-than-expected posting in order to allow the players to test the big league market.\u00a0 This is maybe more noteworthy in Sato\u2019s case since the Tigers are traditionally reluctant to post their players early.\u00a0 Any number of factors can go into a team\u2019s decision-making process about when (or if) to post star players for MLB clubs, but one argument in Sato\u2019s favor might be that he has already helped the Tigers achieve some team success \u2014 the Tigers won the Japan Series in 2023 and reached the Series again in 2025.<\/p>\n

As a reminder, the rules of MLB\/NPB posting system state that when a player is posted, he has 45 days to agree to a contract with a Major League team.\u00a0 If no deal is reached within that time, the player returns to his Japanese team for the next season, though he can be posted again in a future offseason.\u00a0 If a player does agree to a contract to head to North America, his former NPB club will earn a posting fee related to the size of the contract.\u00a0 The NPB team\u2019s fee would equal 20% of the first $25MM of the player\u2019s guaranteed Major League contract, 17.5% of the next $25MM, and 15% of anything beyond the $50MM mark.<\/p>\n

It is possible the posting system could be altered when the new Collective Bargaining Agreement is negotiated next offseason.\u00a0 Changing the system would naturally require input from NPB, and given all of the other major labor issues expected to dominate the talks between the Major League owners and players\u2019 union, the posting system is probably a back-burner issue at best.<\/p>\n

That said, it is a virtual guarantee that the league will lock out the players when the CBA expires on December 1, resulting in a transactions freeze.\u00a0 Since most NPB players aren\u2019t officially posted until at least the second half of November, Itoh and Sato would almost surely have their 45-day windows interrupted, leaving them in limbo throughout however long a work stoppage might last.\u00a0 Either could prefer to stay in NPB for the 2027 season in order to wait out MLB\u2019s labor uncertainty, though it should be noted that the 2021-22 lockout didn\u2019t deter Seiya Suzuki<\/a> from making the jump to the majors.\u00a0 Suzuki was comfortable waiting out what ended up being a 99-day lockout, and he landed his five-year, $85MM deal with the Cubs.<\/p>\n

The markets for this year\u2019s crop of high-profile NPB talent might also impact Itoh and Sato\u2019s decisions.\u00a0 Kazuma Okamoto<\/a> landed a four-year, $60MM deal from the Blue Jays that basically matched projections, but new Astros right-hander Tatsuya Imai<\/a> (three years, $54MM with two opt-out clauses) and new White Sox first baseman Munetaka Murakami<\/a> (two years and $34MM) had to settle for lesser contracts than expected.\u00a0 While obviously players are always trying to post big numbers and correct any flaws in their game, there could be some extra pressure on Itoh and Sato in showcasing themselves during the 2026 season if their hope is to land a pricey MLB contract next winter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MLB teams believe Nippon Professional Baseball stars Hiromi Itoh and Teruaki Sato will both be posted into next…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":623543,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3],"tags":[5,79355,4,3434],"class_list":{"0":"post-623542","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-hiromi-itoh","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-teruaki-sato"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116228032049167461","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/623542","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=623542"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/623542\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/623543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=623542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=623542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=623542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}