Like Tatsuya Imai on Thursday, Kazuma Okamoto is signing his big league deal one day before his posting window officially expires.
According to Jeff Passan , he’s headed to Toronto, where the Blue Jays continue their impressive and expensive offseason.
BREAKING: Japanese third baseman Kazuma Okamoto and the Toronto Blue Jays are in agreement on a free agent contract, sources tell ESPN. — Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) January 3, 2026
The terms of the deal for Kazuma Okamoto...
The San Diego Padres are looking to revamp their corner infield depth, as Manny Machado is a fixture at third base, but the first base position is wide open. Last year’s starter, Luis Arraez, remains a free agent, and Ryan O’Hearn signed a two-year deal with the Pittsburgh Pirates. They added Jose Miranda on a […]
Before the Yankees brought in the right-hander with a bit of an odd wrist movement at the top of his pitching motion in 1995, he was making his rounds with other organizations. David Cone’s career began with the Kansas City Royals, pitching in 11 games before a trade to the Yankees’ crosstown rival, the New […]
Let me be the 47th person to wish you a Happy New Year and welcome you to 2026. Like many of you, I spent some time reflecting on 2025 in the waning days of the year, and part of that reflection came to baseball. I found myself dissatisfied with how the 2025 season played out […]
The NFL is a league of parity. Each year we seem teams make the climb from worst to first with forces pushing good teams back towards average and lifting those from the bottom of the standings back to contention. Out of every last-place team in the NFL, the team with the toughest climb in 2026 […]
The 2025 season is over, and the Dodgers are champions — again! Neat. We have finished signing Auld Lang Syne, and it’s time to turn the page! Schedule-release videos are common and popular in other leagues, such as the National Football League. However, in 2025, MLB and the Dodgers inadvertently released the 2026 schedule on […]
This post is brought to you by FanDuel, proud partner of SBNation. Mountain West gets a D for bowl games. A poor 2-5 showing in bowl games and a few surprising bowlouts made this not great for the Mountain West. The majority of fans gave teh conference a D for their efforts, although many gave a […]
We are in the dead of the MLB winter, which means storylines are few and far between. Once spring training decides to pick up, we’ll hear about who is in what shape, what training regimens have changes and things of this nature, the daily minutiae that we miss from the summer. So, let’s talk about […]
BCB reader Clark Addison sent me this photo just because he thought it was funny, showing umpire Bruce Froemming in the middle of expectorating. He didn’t expect me to want to sleuth it, but… come on now, you know me pretty well by now. I had to do it. So what do we know about […]
One of the most interesting moves the Nats have made this offseason is when they acquired Luis Perales from the Red Sox for Jake Bennett. It was a rare prospect for prospect trade, which saw the Nats acquire Perales, who has an electric arm. Jake Bennett was seen as the safer prospect though. Despite being […]
The Carolina Panthers have been quite rude to their fans this season. Inconsistency, anemic passing, and significant injuries have combined to prevent the Panthers from seizing a moment that has lain waiting for them all season. All it would have taken was a single win over the Arizona Cardinals or the New Orleans Saints and […]
David Leksy writes about the possibility of the Royals pursuing Cubs second baseman Nico Hoerner. And the return will be interesting. First, let’s say he could be had for Bubic. Does that make perfect sense for the Royals? Bubic only has one year remaining before free agency and it’ll cost somewhere in the $6 million […]
Good morning everyone! It’s time to get the weekend started with the latest news from around the league. In Mariners news… Around the league…
Dating back to 1947, the Yankees have used Old-Timers’ Day as a chance to celebrate players from years past. Former superstars and role players alike don the pinstripes once more, hear the roar of the Bronx faithful, and engage in a half-comedic exhibition game. For those who recently left the game, Old-Timers’ Day serves as […]
Meet the Mets While some Mets fans may have been disappointed to see Japanese ace Tatsuya Imai sign elsewhere, the team apparently was not overly high on him and thus did not make a serious pursuit. On the other hand, the Mets are one of the teams that have checked in on free agent outfielder […]
Welcome back to the 16th annual DRaysBay Community Prospect List vote. Here’s how you vote: There will be a selection of players listed in the article and then below in the comments. To vote, reply to the name you’d like to vote for with a +1 in the comment. Polls will be posted three times […]
A new year brings resolutions and Cheri Bell of Gaslamp Ball provides her resolutions for the San Diego Padres. It has been a tumultuous off season that has been painfully slow at times, but as the calendar flips from 2025 to 2026 expectations are that will change and the San Diego roster will change with […]
Good morning, LSB. Not much of anything about the Rangers out there today but there is further info about their more active AL West cohorts. Fangraphs has a post about new Astros starter Tatsuya Imai and why he might be in Houston for a good time but not a long time. MLB dot com has […]
Until he finally retires, it’s hard to go through an offseason without considering long-time ace and future Hall of Famer, Justin Verlander in free agency. Based on the pitching additions by the Tigers already, it’s hard to envision a role for Verlander in 2026. Still, I can’t resist considering the idea anyway, if only as […]
In 2025, Bryce Elder led the Braves’ pitchers in innings pitched. By a lot, as it turned out. It was by 30 innings and 2 outs. That’s the kind of carnage that the starting pitching rotation was subjected to during last season. It might take something like that for him to repeat that. I mean, […]
In something of a surprise move, the Astros added Tatsuya Imai to their rotation on a three year deal that includes a lot of opt-outs. A lot of these incentives are interesting in that they kind of indicate that maybe a lot of teams aren’t really sure he’ll translate to being a starter in MLB. […]
The Red Sox are stepping into the 2026 season in a way they haven’t since 2022: off a (short) playoff run. That’s not nothing. While the offseason hasn’t seen any free agent signings — big or small — there have been notable trades. 1. On a recent episode of Effectively Wild both guests, Craig Goldstein […]
Mika Zibanejad set records, the Rangers rolled in Miami, and the Winter Classic delivered one of the most unexpected outcomes of the season.
After dropping games in two consecutive weeks, the 11-5 Los Angels Rams will host the 3-13 Arizona Cardinals Sunday January 4 at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Ca. Kickoff is scheduled for 1:25 p.m. PST. It’s Week 18, the final weekend of the NFL regular season. L.A. will move on to the playoffs, while the RedBirds […]
Good morning! The internet is ablaze with reports that the Red Sox have “made an aggressive offer” to Alex Bregman. Something to keep in mind here, though: As you can hear in the above clip (start at 7:15), this chatter originated from an offhand remark made by ESPN’s Buster Olney — while he was on […]