Roki Sasaki Plans on Adding Another Pitch This Year With Dodgers
Roki Sasaki’s journey to stateside baseball was unique for several reasons, but perhaps the most intriguing aspect of the 23-year-old’s free agency process was how he selected a team.
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Whether a team had Japanese players was of no importance to Sasaki. Whether a team had any championship titles was of little importance to Sasaki. Instead, the main priority for Sasaki was choosing an organization that had a reputation for strong pitching development.
At Sasaki’s introductory press conference, he explained why the Los Angeles Dodgers emerged as his final choice.
“I spent the past month both embracing and reflecting on this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to choose a place purely based on where I can grow as a player the most,” Sasaki said, through team interpreter Will Ireton. “Every organization helped me in its own way, and it was an incredibly difficult decision to choose just one.
“I had the opportunity to speak to a lot of teams, and they had a lot of appealing features. But overall when I looked at the general consensus, I thought that the Dodgers were at the top.”
During his time with the Chiba Lotte Marines in NPB, his two best pitches were a fastball and splitter. Now, as spring training begins, Sasaki will lean on the Dodgers to help him add another pitch to his collection.
“My fastball and splitter are sort of the faces of my arsenal,” Sasaki said, via Bob Nightengale of USA Today, “and they weren’t initially as their best last year. So, I want to focus on just getting those back to their best and then mixing in the slider that will expand my repertoire as I go.”
Sasaki produced a 2.35 ERA with a 10-5 record in 18 games last season for the Marines. He fanned 128 batters in 111 innings, but as he made the jump to MLB, his agent Joel Wolfe explained Sasaki still needed refinement.
“Roki is by no means a finished product,” Wolfe said. “He knows it; teams know it. He’s incredibly talented, but he’s a guy that wants to be great. “He’s not just coming here to get rich or get a big contract.”
The Sasaki sweepstakes concluded a few weeks ago and the 23-year-old is now beginning his MLB journey with the Dodgers. Despite being a young pitcher, president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman believes Sasaki has the potential to emerge as baseball’s best pitcher.
“Even then, his explosive fastball, pinpoint command and poise beyond his years stood out,” Friedman said. “Roki has gone on to set records. He has made an indelible mark on the international stage. And we couldn’t be more excited about this partnership with him.”
The real test for Sasaki and the Dodgers begins now.
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