The Mariners announced that right-hander Yoshihisa Hirano has been signed to a one-year, Major League contract. Hirano is represented by John Boggs & Associates. Left-hander Ricardo Sanchez has been designated for assignment to create roster space.
Hirano will earn $1.6MM in guaranteed money, as per The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal (all Twitter links), plus incentive bonuses based on numbers of games pitched and finished. Hirano can begin to unlock these bonuses if he makes at least 30 appearances, or finishes at least 20 games. There is also a $250K transaction payment due to Hirano whenever he is traded.
After coming to Major League Baseball on a two-year, $6MM deal with the Diamondbacks in the 2017-18 offseason, Hirano finished sixth in NL Rookie Of The Year voting in 2018 after posting a 2.44 ERA, 2.57 K/BB rate, 50.3% grounder rate, and 8.0 K/9 over 66 1/3 innings out of Arizona’s pen. Despite a higher strikeout rate (10.4 K/9) and K/BB rate (2.77) in 2019, Hirano’s ERA ballooned to 4.75 over 53 frames, and he also spent a few weeks on the injured list due to elbow inflammation.
Despite the wide gap in ERA over the two seasons, Hirano’s advanced metrics indicate a pretty similar level of performance in both 2018 (3.69 FIP, 4.01 xFIP, 3.76 SIERA, .311 xwOBA) and 2019 (4.04 FIP, 4.24 xFIP, 3.95 SIERA, .296 xwOBA). Hirano finished in the 94th percentile of all pitchers in terms of limiting hard contact last season, so the Mariners are hoping the righty can translate that soft contact into better on-field results.
Though Hirano (who turns 36 in March) only has four career saves, the number of finish-saved incentives in his contract indicate that the Mariners see him as a potential answer to their unsettled ninth-inning situation. Matt Magill is ostensibly the top in-house choice after saving five games for the M’s down the stretch last season, though those were the only five saves of Magill’s big league career. While Hirano rarely got the call in save situations for the D’Backs, he has a long and successful history of saving games in Japan, racking up 143 saves for the Orix Buffaloes between 2013-17.
Sanchez posted a 4.44 ERA, 3.55 K/BB rate, and 8.3 K/9 over 146 innings for Double-A Arkansas last season, starting all 27 of his games. The 22-year-old southpaw already has six years of professional experience, beginning in the Angels’ system before pitching with the Braves from 2015-18.
Sure, he was excellent in his rookie season, but seriously? A reliever that was 5-5 and had an ERA close to 5.00 gets a major league deal? It was by one of the most dysfunctional franchises in baseball, though, so it’s not that surprising.
Well, as noted in the article, look at the advanced metrics; the two seasons might not have had as much of a gap as a quick glance might indicate. Besides, at the price point (I’m assuming he didn’t get a raise; as of just now, no mention of salary in the story) and with at least one pretty fair season to his credit, why not take a flyer?
4.04 FIP is decent tho for just under $2m. Don’t know why you’re getting angry, but this looks like a good signing for a team with only a couple of guys set in the bullpen rn.
It’s always easy to spot the guy who didn’t read the analytical portion of the article.
His splitter was pretty sharp in his first season but I think the NL just figured him out in his second season. New division, new league: maybe his success comes back albeit for not a very long period.
Japanese players are drawn to Seattle like metal shavings to a magnet
Is that a bad thing? Seattle is pretty popular over there because of some guy named Ichiro. Ever heard of him?
He never said it was. You made that assumption.
Has nothing to do with ichiro, Seattle to Tokyo is the shortest flight possible from the continental us to Japan.
Sanchez is still a project, but i feel like he can still be a good pitcher at some point. he’ll probably be out of options by that point though.
I feel like we DFAd him since we have a lot of soft tossing LHPs. Margavicius or however you spell it was probably favored over Sanchez. Hopefully Sanchez can clear waivers
Decent path to saves for him in Seattle.
Future waiver wire pickup in a 12 person fantasy league right there!
I thought the Ricardo Sanchez acquisition was supposed to be a fairly big deal…what happened for them to DFA him?
I don’t think it was a big deal… we essentially traded cash for him a year or two ago when the braves were trying to get rid of him. Doesn’t have a lot of upside at all, especially for a 22 year old.
M’s just picked up another soft tossing lefty in margavicius last week and we already have 3 lefties in our rotation.
Sanchez profiles as nothing more than a no.5 starter in the future.
Nothing more than a number 5 SP for the Albuquerque Isotopes maybe!?
Solid acquisition for the mariners. Always good to sign a bunch of cheap relievers, you might get a lotto ticket or some slapdick prospect at the deadline
The Nick Vincent pick up from the Padres late in Spring training about 4 yrs ago was a good cheap deal. I’ve never seen a RP get so many whiffs on an 88mph FB before! That pitch must have had a super high spin rate- something!