2 weeks Ago By Rob Parent
PHILADELPHIA — Because he made himself available to Major League Baseball execs while under the age of 25, Japanese pitcher Roki Sasaki was going to be a relative bargain.Sasaki, who made his third start of the season Saturday at Citizens Bank Park, had to come over under the status of international free agent because he’s only 23. That limited him to be able to sign only a minor league contract, and despite seriously being courted by several teams, of course he signed with the Dodgers in late January.
They supplied him with a $6.5 million signing bonus. Surprisingly that was about a million under the maximum bonus pool money that could be awarded to a top IFA.
Sasaki then made the club out of training camp, but will be under the club’s contractual control for six full seasons.Little matter to Sasaki now, as he indeed has phenom stuff but needs time to control that, too. Though he entered the game without a decision in two starts, and a not-so-hot 5.
79 ERA, Sasaki fared well enough against the Phillies to at least leave the game with a lead, with his third no-decision winding up in a 3-1 Dodgers win over the Phillies.It wasn’t that way in Sasaki’s only two previous starts. He had allowed one earned run, three hits and five walks in only three innings pitched on March 19, in an opening series win over the Chicago Cubs played in Japan.
Then 10 days later, Sasaki only went two outs deep into the second inning against Detroit, after giving up a pair of runs on three hits and walking four.But before Sasaki threw one pitch against his Phils, manager Rob Thomson wasn’t acting fooled by the Dodgers pitcher’s start.“I know he’s got great stuff,” Thomson said of Sasaki before the game.
“He’s got a big fastball, and the split’s really good. So far, evidently, he’s had some issues with control and command. I think (fellow Dodger Yoshinobu) Yamamoto had that issue the first two starts last year and then he took off.
But this guy’s got good stuff so we’ll just have to play it by ear and see what we’ve got.”Sasaki showed a variety of what he’s got in his pitching arsenal against the Phillies, allowing a first-inning run but then settling down and cruising through the next three. In so doing, he went longer than his first two starts.
But he walked J.T. Realmuto to start the fifth, then allowed a flare to center by Bryson Stott that went for a single.
With a pair of left-handed hitters next up in Brandon Marsh and Kyle Schwarber, Dodgers manager Dave Roberts pulled his young pitcher, with only 68 (a new big-league high for him) pitches thrown.But Sasaki clearly left an impact on the Phils.“His splitter feels like a screwball, in a sense,” Stott said.
“It goes up and comes down really hard. It’s a good pitch and he was throwing it for a strike today, so that made it tough.”“Yeah, he’s good,” Trea Turner added.
“He’s got that funky splitter, and a good heater and he’s got that slider to go with it. He seems super athletic and has an idea what he’s doing.”Before he left, there seemed to be no issues for Sasaki with what former major leaguer Eric Hosmer threw out on Twitter a week or so ago, commenting that Sasaki’s hand was “obviously sticky” after he left the Detroit game.
The cheating gossip by Hosmer failed to stick.Meanwhile, the Dodgers got ahead on Aaron Nola early via a two-run homer by No. 8 hitter Kike Hernandez.
But Nola escaped trouble in a few other innings along the way.“It’s a good lineup for anybody,” Thomson said when asked pre-game about Nola, who coming into the game Saturday had the Phillies’ only loss, a 5-1 setback in Washington on March 30. “Usually he rises to the occasion, makes adjustments.
I thought he was really good the last time; just made a couple of bad pitches. That happens.”Those couple of pitches went for home runs.
And with Nola, that does indeed happen, as it would with the Hernandez homer in the second inning Saturday, and again in the sixth to Michael Conforto, giving the Dodgers the 3-1 lead that would stand up the rest of the way.• • •It was generally reported one time or another in the offseason that most teams in the majors were at least interested in trying to sign Sasaki. That included the Phillies, though when asked about the level of serious interest the Phils might have had, Thomson knew how to make his approach.
“I’m not really sure about that; that’s above my pay grade, as they say,” Thomson said. “But I do know we were interested.”• • •Ranger Suarez (back issues) looked good in a rehab assignment in Clearwater Saturday.
Thomson said he threw 34 pitches, with his fastball “normal.”“In the first inning he was really, really good,” Thomson said. “Command wasn’t quite as good (in the second inning) as the first, but it was still good.
He threw all his pitches. Breaking ball was sharp, changeup looked good. It was good.
”Thomson said he’d probably have further news on Suarez’s agenda “in the next couple of days.”.
