Philadelphia Phillies Receive Blow in Yamamoto Pursuit

The Philadelphia Phillies are reportedly still in the market for another starter despite re-signing ace Aaron Nola to a seven-year, $172 million deal just days ago.

One name on their radar, along with most MLB teams, is Japanese superstar Yoshinobu Yamamoto who was just posted by his NPB club. 

However, the Phillies may already be out of the running. 

According to Yamamoto's agent in a recent article in Japanese that was translated to English, he has no geographical preference. 

"He has no geographic preferences and wants to play anywhere.'' 

That's huge news for the Phillies who play on the East Coast. When Shohei Ohtani originally moved to the United States he wanted to play on the West Coast. That limited him to just a handful of MLB teams and severely restricted his ability to compete for a championship.

Yamamoto and his agent are likely to avoid that mistake. 

But where it gets bad for the Phillies is the fact that Yamamoto wants to play with other Japanese players. 

"He wants to play with Japanese players... He is different from previous Japanese players."

That is the blow for Philadelphia. Currently, there are exactly zero Japanese players on the active roster. 

If the Phillies hope to acquire Yamamoto's services, they may have to invest in some more Japanese players before making their approach to Yamamoto. 

However, if Yamamoto's desire to compete for a World Series and play in front of a passionate fanbase, Philadelphia is hard to beat. Hopefully he doesn't make the same mistake Ohtani did when first arriving in the US.