It is that wonderful and beautiful time of the year again with NPB starting back later today/tonight based on your time zone, so join me in previewing this upcoming season and which specific players to watch (MLB quality talent/rookie to watch)
First things first, we have to explain where the foreigner situation currently sits for those not as connected to the league. As of publishing, the majority of gaijin have been kept out of Japan due to their state of emergency and only up until the past week were those players able to gain access and enter the country. With this comes an enforced two-week quarantine and then those players will finally be able to start training with their teams. There have been some ideas floating around suggesting that all of the foreign players stay at the Tokyo Dome area in order to work out and train together as they get back to playing shape post-quarantine before returning to their teams, but nothing has been confirmed yet. All we know is the foreigners not in the country yet won’t be playing in games for at least a month or so. This creates some really awkward and awful situations for certain teams (Looking at you Baystars).
Anyways, hope you enjoy my ramblings! Central League coming soon!
Pacific League Preview:
Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks
Who else? The Hawks continued their dynasty last season easily sweeping the Yomiuri Giants in the 2020 Japan Series. It is at this point now that the Hawks are easily in the conversation for some of the best teams and dynasties in all of sports history after winning 7 titles in the past 10 years. However, just as Rome, the 90s Bulls, and the great dynasty that was Blockbuster, all dynasties crumble over time.... just not this year. The Hawks may have lost big names that have helped in title pushes in the past, Matt Moore, Rick Van Den Hurk, Seiichi Uchikawa. But additions of Colin Rea, Nick Martinez, and future prospect Andy Rodriguez out of Cuba spell continued success. Also having Yurisbel Gracial, Alfredo Despagne and Livan Moinelo from the start of the season will have a huge impact. The Hawks, although losing out on more names than adding, the ever so strong farm and player development system ensures that no matter how much they lose, they have enough depth to still be competitive. They still have the very talented arms and bats, that are enough to end up first. Although it will be tighter than typical, I still have the Hawks ending in first.
MLB Potential: Yuki Yanagita, Kodai Senga and Livan Moinelo
The defending PL MVP of last season is once again back to drive the Hawks to another title. If Yanagita stays healthy and mashes like he did last year then I don’t think anyone comes close to him in the MVP races once again. Slashing an incredible .342/.449/.623 in 2020 with 29 bombs and an NPB best 8.4 WAR (2.7 points higher than the next closest player), Yanagita is still the dominant “Gita” we all know and love. Getting to watch him play is similar to watching Mike Trout. You know how great of a player he is and yet still somehow expands your expectations. If you have to watch one player from one game this season, It’s by far him.
Although not to be outdone by his fellow teammate, Kodai Senga had a solid return to the mound with a healthy 2020. Posting a career-best as a starter ERA of 2.16 over the stretch of 18 starts and 121 IP. Senga is still a very powerful pitcher, still able to hit upper 90s on the radar guns topping out at 100 last season, with his ghastly “Haunted Fork” that is still just as good as ever at 83 that falls off a table. He also throws a cutter around 20% of the time with a slider rounding it out.
As easy as it would’ve been to just skimp on this and just reiterate the first two names on here as most lists that talk about potential players to make the MLB jump feature both Yanagita and Senga. There is another guy that is just too good to not be mentioned. With SoftBank’s reluctance to post players and even with Senga’s annual begging of them to send him stateside, the chances of Senga or Yanagita reaching the MLB this upcoming off-season is extremely low. However, Senga does have domestic free agency after this year, and international free agency the year following that. So I would expect Senga to be coming over after the 2022 season. In the meantime, let’s mention one of my favorite relievers to watch in the entire league, and if anybody knows me, they would know that I absolutely adore a reliever who comes in and demolishes batters and slams the door shut every single appearance. For that reason, Livan Moinelo deserves the mention.
Moinelo is a Cuban LHP with one of the best curveballs in all of professional baseball. Regularly reaching a stunning RPM of over 3000, the pitch is absolutely unfair to hitters. A truly vicious hard biting 1-7 break from a high ¾ armslot. Moinelo will mostly depend on this as an out pitch but also throws in his fastball around the middle-90s that at times isn’t strong command wise inducing walks but when it's landing well it can be used as a way to throw off hitters sitting on the curveball. That as well as a slider and changeup. I like the changeup the most of the two as its another good way to throw hitters off if they sit fastball or the curveball. Both are solid pitches at the end of the day. With a K/9 of around 14 and a WHIP around 1, he comes in for SoftBank and outside of sequences of poor command, is shut down. It is too bad that he has been mostly used as a setup guy his career with SoftBank behind Yuito Mori, another showcase to just how stacked the Hawks have been over the years. Regardless, Moinelo has plenty of the talent required to make an MLB bullpen and has more than the stuff needed to succeed.
It’s about to get very tight after this as the next three teams could realistically finish in any order but this is what I’ll go with:
Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles
It was another big money spending offseason for the Eagles as unless you were living under a rock over the offseason you would’ve already heard about the return of Masahiro Tanaka. Tanaka returns to Sendai and the hopes of winning a title suddenly becomes much higher. A very strong rotation of Hideaki Wakui, Masahiro Tanaka, Takahiro Norimoto, Takayuki Kishi and new rookie draft pick Takahisa Hayakawa. Pairing with them is an average lineup composed of the very powerful and 2020 HR King, Hideto Asamura and the always solid Daichi Suzuki. Ryosuke Tatsumi and Hiroaki Shimauchi look very good this spring, with Tatsumi looking to have taken a strong step forward in his progression. The Eagles are hoping to take their lineup and provide some needed run support for what should be one of the better rotations in NPB. The Eagles at the earlier point of last year was one of the highest scoring lineups before eventually falling back to average.
However, that's when the doubt for the team starts to arrive. Even at points in the season when Asamura started to cool off after looking like a potential MVP winner, the offense felt stale and felt like it was being solely driven by Stefan Romero’s power for when Asamura and others started to pick it back up late in the year. With Romero gone to reunite in Osaka with the Buffaloes and Jabari Blash retiring, it brings up large questions about how the lineup will hold up throughout the season powerwise. Meanwhile, although the rotation should be very solid there are still valid questions there as well. Hideaki Wakui was vintage in 2020, expecting him to keep that up isn’t likely. Even though Norimoto should return back to his ace quality of the past, it's not guaranteed with how inconsistent he has been. Every pitcher besides Hayakawa is in their thirties and can very easily regress. Hayakawa projects to be a very good pitcher over time and is one of my favorites from the most recent draft, but he is still a rookie with room to grow and a lot to learn in a league where all of the teams can put up plenty of runs every night. So if the pitching becomes what it is supposed to be and the lineup holds up throughout the season then I can see them finishing second. However, if the aging of the rotation leads to regression or the lineup doesn’t supply enough run support, it could be a long season.
Arm of the Future
The highest touted arm of the past draft, Takahisa Hayakawa is in a big role for the Eagles in 2021. The good thing is, the rookie is absolutely filthy. Hayakawa was very impressive in 2020 dominating the Tokyo Big 6 college competition bumping his numbers from the past year. Able to spot his fastball working around 90-93 mph, up to 95, he builds off that with a nasty high spin rate cutter (2700 rpm) and slider (2900 rpm). Both tunneling well together. In addition he can throw a more than solid changeup that runs a bit armside. In addition to a big hammer curveball that can be used as another out pitch in addition to the slider and changeup. The curveball gets more vertical break than his slider takes the hitters off of the other breaker. Lastly, he can throw a fork that with some work can be another quality pitch if all of the other breaking offers don’t matchup well. He had some moments of success in his spring against the Baystars where he pitched 4 innings allowing just 1 hit and striking out 5. While also having some moments of struggle against a strong experienced lineup as the Giants, walking 2 and allowing 5 runs off 7 hits and 2 homeruns. However, just off the glimpses of quality he’s shown in just the three appearances, Hayakawa is definitely a name to follow.
Saitama Seibu Lions
The Lions are coming into the new season hoping for a return to old form, as the defending pennant winners, as it appears that the loss of Shogo Akiyama may have proved more vital than expected. A strong lack of pitching quality and off years for both stars Hotaka Yamakawa and Tomoya Mori, led to the Lions struggling for the majority of the year until catching steam later on. That late push was strong enough to allow them to pass Rakuten and finish third. As much as their pitching will still struggle, missing out on ace Zach Neal for a month will definitely hurt. Their offense seems to be returning back to normal for 2021. There are still arms to like in the rotation and pen however. Kona Takahashi will be the opening day starter and posted a 3.1 WAR. As well as flamethrowing Pacific League Rookie of the Year, Kaima Taira will be back in the pen and just as good, if not better. The chances of another year of Yamakawa hitting just barely over the mendoza line and Tomoya Mori struggling at the plate feels low and even if Takumi Kuriyama doesn’t have another career year, the Lions offense should still be powerful enough to make up for their pitching woes. Also the great defensive duo of 2B Shuta Tonosaki and SS Sosuke Genda will help in 2021 both in the field and at the plate. Meanwhile, Cory Spangenberg was surprisingly good last year and should have another very solid year for the Lions once he is able to join back with the team. Overall, the Lions may have been underperformers in 2020, after all they did win a pennant not that long ago. If continued struggles on the hitting side and poor pitching occur, it may hold them back for another year.
The Player Formerly Known as “Brandon”
Brandon Taiga Tysinger was the 6th round draft pick of the Seibu Lions last fall. At the initial time it was being discussed more for the name than the quality of player. After being officially registered just as “Brandon (ブランドン)”, “Brandon” wouldn’t take long to make his name known in the league. Hitting .259 and 2 homeruns in his 27 at-bats, “Brandon” will get the chance with the ichi-gun squad to start the year and will be looking to build on the strong spring. An all around solid infielder with room to grow, “Brandon” will be an easy name to remember and follow throughout this season.
Chiba Lotte Marines
One of the brightest lights of 2020 was the rise of the Marines. Before a covid outbreak would kill any chances of the team winning the pennant, the Marines were going toe to toe with the Hawks. Led by a mix of veterans Takashi Ogino, Seiya Inoue, and pitchers Ayumu Ishikawa and Kota Futaki. As well as Foreign slugger Leonys Martin, the Marines survived with a less than stellar offense and survived by fantastic pitching performances, strong defense and their good bullpen. However, it seems that although there is youth with promise coming through the ranks with Roki Sasaki, Kyota Fujiwara, Hisanori Yasuda and Koki Yamaguchi. I feel as if there could be a stronger chance of growing pains than the chance of repeated success. The Marines have improved in the power area with Martin and Brandon Laird and Inoue over the past couple of years, but the others haven’t supplied much along side with them. If that continues and the pitching isn’t as great as last year the Marines could experience a bit of a disappointing year.
However, with that comes the bright opportunity for the youngsters to shine.
The Future of Chiba
For the Marines to build off last year’s wonderful year they’ll need the youth to take the next step up. The biggest of these names is by far, Roki Sasaki. Sasaki since high school has been one of the biggest names in the prospect world, attracting attention from all around the globe. After two appearances consisting of a total of three innings in his professional career, it is more than obvious that Sasaki will need to put in innings on the farm and that is what the Marines will do to begin the season. Slowly building up his innings and hopefully if all goes well return to the top team later in the season. If you would like to read more about Sasaki I wrote about him in last year’s “players to watch” article here. So in the meantime let's focus on some players who will get an opportunity to perform sooner than later.
Those include Kyota Fujiwara, Hisanori Yasuda and Koki Yamaguchi. Although Yasuda may not have posted the best looking numbers, in his run with the top team last year he showed some strong promise. He started out red hot to begin the season before having a poor august, picking it back up in September and then and then a dire October. When he was hot he was hitting well with bits and pieces of power. If he can cut out the plentiful strikeouts while getting stronger this season, then he could become a useful piece of the lineup.
Another really intriguing bat from his short time last season was Kyota Fujiwara providing 3 HR in his first 96 AB with the top team while hitting .260/.301/.406. Although early struggles in spring have occurred for him, I think he’ll bounce back as we go into the season. Koki Yamaguchi also should add more power to the lineup that the Marines need. After hitting .258/.315/.393 hitting 7 home runs and stealing 14 bags over 244 ABs on the farm last year. He will be making his top team debut early on as he will be starting the year with them. Yamaguchi has excellent bat speed with loft that has shown off in the spring matches, hitting 2 home runs already. That excellent bat speed allows for him to crush balls when he connects and pulls a ball. He also can rip fastballs in on the hands as he showed on the farm last year. However, the swing needs to be tightened up a bit as its still a bit wild and comes with it a danger of swing and miss.
Lastly, I’ll also tab Akito Takabe in here as well as he mashed on the farm last year hitting .344/.367/.422 with 14 SBs. Although he went 1-10 in a very short sip of coffee in ichi-gun last year. He is already back off to a hot start this spring, and I like him to get more run this season at ichi-gun. He also has a fantastic story so I am really rooting for him to do well.
Orix Buffaloes
Where do I start with the Buffaloes? Forever stuck in the doldrums of the Pacific League, filled with individual talent that can never get it done nor get out of the pit of the last place. After another dead last finish for them, 2021 is looking up. As much as they have disappointed and as hard as it is to trust them, I think this could be the year the Buffaloes finally snap out of it and actually compete for at the very least 5th. Filled with youth and potential, the Buffaloes really have an intriguing team on paper. Both Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Masataka Yoshida are some of the best players in the Pacific League and if not all of NPB. Taisuke Yamaoka should come back stronger after missing a lot of last year with an injury. Adam Jones and Steven Moya will have another year under their belt, Takahiro Okada will have crazy power once again and when Stefan Romero arrives with the team, he’ll be there to apply plenty of offensive firepower. In addition with young players who have shown promise this spring and last year in the likes of Hiroya Miyagi, Ryo Ohta and Yuma Tongu. Kodai Sano looks to have taken a major step in the spring in the leadoff role as well. Yoshihisa Hirano returns from the MLB and Tyler Higgins and Brandon Dickson should be solid in the bullpen again.
However, as intriguing as the team is, there’s still an eerie feeling in the back of my mind that haunts me the way Orix always does. Although there is plenty of power there is a fair chance they don't hit enough for average, when the power doesn’t supply. As well as behind Yamamoto and Yamaoka there isn’t much left in the rotation. Lastly, as anyone knows, any young player produces some sort of risk, especially without a full year of results to prove they can provide good performances. We can only hope their defense and baserunning gaffs don’t continue this year and the Buffaloes can exceed expectations and finish 5th and above.
Orix needs a Hiro-ya
A big potential reason for the Buffaloes' success is in rookie LHP Hiroya Miyagi. Miyagi was the 1st overall pick by the Buffaloes in the 2019 draft. After only 3 starts in 2020, Miyagi looks poised to have a strong 2021. Miyagi has been impressive in his starts of the spring against the Baystars, the defending Central League Champions and two-time defending Japan Series loser Giants, and an extra impressive 11 strikeout start against the Tigers. Miyagi uses a low 90s fastball out of a ¾ arm slot, yes the velocity isn’t the best but Miyagi excels at using strong pitchability to have his stuff play up. He mostly mixes in a classic sweeping slider around 80mph away to LHH and to cut in on the hands of the RHH. It can be used as an out pitch against both handednesses. Miyagi mixes that with a big slow curveball that ranges in velocities of 68 mph all the way down to 60 mph. It breaks well from 2:00 to 8:00 and really throws hitters off, often freezing hitters because their timing is so destroyed or making them whiff badly over it. In addition to those, Miyagi includes a changeup around 75 mph that also dies off and gives the hitter another look. The very encouraging thing about Miyagi is that he doesn’t solely rely on the fastball to set up the breakers. If he gets behind in a count he won’t be afraid to use all three of the other offerings to get over the plate for strikes. Being able to battle back into counts and keep hitters off.
Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters
The Fighters are in an interesting situation, although the team has plenty of potential talent waiting in the wings. The lack of progression in the development of those has stagnated their return to A class. At times last year, the offense felt fully revolved around the talents of Sho Nakata, even with very good players like always hitting Kensuke Kondoh and being able to bring back Haruki Nishikawa. As well as Taishi Ohta who is looking to try his luck in the MLB market again following this season, who at times can be an above-average player with his gigantic arm in RF showing out from time to time. Even when Drew VerHagen is able to arrive with the team, he’ll be building off of a team-best 3.8 WAR season. Rookie pitcher Hiromi Itoh has looked pretty good so far in his first spring and Yuki Nomura had an intriguing 2020. However, with that comes a whole bunch of question marks. A lack of other power outside of Nakata raises questions, and when Nakata isn’t providing, the rest of the lineup can be quiet. As well as this season is a massive make or break season for Kotaro Kiyomiya. A long fall from grace after being viewed as the can’t miss prospect of the decade. Three years in a row of hitting at the Mendoza line or worse without producing enough power to come close to making up for it. As well as the obvious loss of Kohei Arihara and losing out on Nick Martinez as well bodes for a year of struggling for the Fighters.
Hometown Kid Looking To Start His Career
2020 first-round draft pick of the Fighters, Hiromi Itoh was born and raised in the Hokkaido prefecture as the third generation of octopus fishermen. Growing up as a Fighters fan, Itoh would grow his love of the team by watching his favorite pitcher Yu Darvish. Little would he know that he would end up becoming not only a Fighter, but one with heavy expectations as the first round pick. However, after a strong spring and good appearances, Ito might just live up to his expectations. Itoh was the go-to closer for the Samurai Japan U18s in 2019 and will look to slot right into the Fighters rotation as possible. He will be starting with the farm team this season, but a good stretch of starts down there could lead to a promotion to ichi-gun. Itoh can hit up to 96 but sits under that near the low 90s. My favorite of Itoh’s pitches and what succeeded very well for him this spring is the slider. Having been measured around 2,500 RPM it breaks well away from right-handed hitters around mid 80s. At times the curveball can also show well against left-handed hitters, and I also like the very slow and dying forkball that gets a bit of arm side run.
Image Credit: Bunshun.jp
