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Bidding Period For Yu Darvish Ends

The deadline for teams to submit bids to the Nippon Ham Fighters for the exclusive rights to negotiate with Yu Darvish passed at 4pm central time today.  Nippon Ham has until 4pm CDT on December 20th to accept or reject the high bid, according to a Japanese report passed along by Patrick Newman of NPB Tracker (on Twitter).  The latest updates:

• The Giants did not bid on Darvish, according to John Shea of the San Francisco Chronicle (Twitter link).
• The A's didn't bid on Darvish, according to Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle (on Twitter).
• The Marlins did not bid on Darvish, according to Clark Spencer of the Miami Herald (on Twitter).
• The Mets didn't place a bid, Howard Megdal of the Journal News reports.
• The Yankees' bid is modest, according to Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com (on Twitter). Indications are the winning bid is "sky high."
• Jeff Passan of Yahoo! Sports reports (on Twitter) that the Fighters plan to accept the posting bid no matter how large it is.
• The Nippon Ham Fighters were very excited by how large the high bid was according to Danny Knobler of CBSSports.com (on Twitter). Still no word on the the money, though.
• The Yankees did post a bid, according to ESPN.com's Buster Olney (Twitter link). 
• The Rays did not bid, according to Marc Topkin of the St. Petersburg Times (on Twitter).
• The Angels did not bid on Darvish, according to MLB.com's Alden Gonzalez (on Twitter).
• Three MLB executives speculated that the Blue Jays and Rangers are candidates to win the bidding for Darvish, according to ESPN.com's Buster Olney (on Twitter).
• The Twins did not bid on Darvish, according to Joe Christensen of the Minneapolis Star Tribune (on Twitter).
• The Red Sox did not bid on Darvish, according to Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe (on Twitter).
• At least one team submitted a bid on Darvish, according to Jack Curry of the YES Network (on Twitter).  Nippon, which doesn't know the identity of the MLB team that won the bidding, must decide whether to accept the high bid by Tuesday.
• One MLB official expects an announcement regarding the winning bid tonight or tomorrow morning, tweets Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post.
• The Orioles are not bidding on Darvish, Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com reports (on Twitter).
• Darvish has more leverage than any previous player coming from Japan to MLB, one executive tells Yahoo's Jeff Passan, because the righty seems willing to stay with the Fighters.  In October, my poll of five agents and one team executive showed that they felt he has the leverage to extract a five or six-year deal worth $72-75MM from the winning team, on top of a posting fee for the Fighters ranging from $30-55MM.  Passan's survey of six executives suggests the Rangers and Blue Jays are favorites for Darvish and the Nationals, Yankees, and Mariners may submit bids.  Darvish appears to have a strong preference for the West Coast.  Passan feels that the higher the posting fee gets, the less likely Darvish is to sign.
• In a poll of over 26,000 MLBTR readers yesterday, 27% felt the Yankees would win the bid, followed by 17% for the Blue Jays and 15% for the Rangers.

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