Tatsuya Imai to the Astros

[We Got The Whole 9]

1 hour ago, Rcal10 said:

Why do you say this? Cubs have a lot of near ready bats. IMO they can easily put something together for Cabrera. I am just not sure what bat they sign if they did trade for Cabrera. That would have a good amount of money to spend but not enough for Bregman. 

Idk, just kind of lukewarm on the guys we would likely package and I dont think they carry the type of value we would need. I have a hard time believing a team wouldn't offer a better prospect than Caissie.

[thawv]

On 12/24/2025 at 4:14 PM, CubinNY said:

Yes, my guess is that Hoyer gave them his best offer and they are shopping it or a better offer from another team. Boras will wait until the last minute to see what happens. 

I would assume any contract offer has a deadline to accept.  They aren't going to make an offer with no deadline to sign.  That's a terrible idea for more than just one reason. 

[CubinNY]

44 minutes ago, thawv said:

I would assume any contract offer has a deadline to accept.  They aren't going to make an offer with no deadline to sign.  That's a terrible idea for more than just one reason. 

They do it all the time, lol. Why would they put a deadline on a process that already has a deadline and the seat doesn’t start until April?

Edited December 29, 2025 by CubinNY

[thawv]

1 hour ago, CubinNY said:

They do it all the time, lol. Why would they put a deadline on a process that already has a deadline and the seat doesn’t start until April?

Because no team makes any open-ended contract offer.  They all have a timeline to accept the offer.  Even with a posting deadline.  

[Rcal10]

2 minutes ago, thawv said:

Because no team makes any open-ended contract offer.  They all have a timeline to accept the offer.  Even with a posting deadline.  

Where do you get this knowledge of how all front offices work? I don’t know that to be true. I mean, I am sure there is some sort of expectation when a team makes an offer. They may expect to hear back within a reasonable time, but I doubt they say you have until a certain date to take it or leave it. While an offer is out there they may move to something else and then that previous offer may go away, but I really doubt they put an expiration date on an offer. 

[thawv]

25 minutes ago, Rcal10 said:

Where do you get this knowledge of how all front offices work? I don’t know that to be true. I mean, I am sure there is some sort of expectation when a team makes an offer. They may expect to hear back within a reasonable time, but I doubt they say you have until a certain date to take it or leave it. While an offer is out there they may move to something else and then that previous offer may go away, but I really doubt they put an expiration date on an offer. 

I'm assuming that a baseball contract is like every other contract in the business world.  I've written many contracts, and signed many contracts, and in no case was there ever not a time to accept the contract.  What this tpye of time frame is, is something that I don't know.  It could be 7 days.  It could be 30 days.  But not putting a deadline on accepting lets the player search for as long as he wants meanwhile the team making the offer is held hostage until they hear back from him.  Are they just going to wait 5 months to hear an answer?   

Edited December 29, 2025 by thawv

[TarzanJoeWallis]

9 minutes ago, thawv said:

I'm assuming that a baseball contract is like every other contract in the business world.  I've written many contracts, and signed many contracts, and in no case was there ever not a time to accept the contract.  What this tpye of time frame is, is something that I don't know.  It could be 7 days.  It could be 30 days.  But not putting a deadline on accepting lets the player search for as long as he wants meanwhile the team making the offer is held hostage until they hear back from him.  Are they just going to wait 5 months to hear an answer?   

But it’s not a contract. It’s a negotiation and an offer—probably just a range to begin with. Sure, once they get to the point where they are doing final negotiations and create a contract then there would be a deadline, but not likely not during negotiations. 

[thawv]

2 minutes ago, TarzanJoeWallis said:

But it’s not a contract. It’s a negotiation and an offer—probably just a range to begin with. Sure, once they get to the point where they are doing final negotiations and create a contract then there would be a deadline, but not likely not during negotiations. 

In the beginning for sure.  But there's always an official contract offer to sign the player after they've done their talking or negotiating.  They may have a verbal agreement in place, and then they draw it up which will eliminate the "deadline date."  And that may actually be how it usually works.  

[TarzanJoeWallis]

18 minutes ago, thawv said:

In the beginning for sure.  But there's always an official contract offer to sign the player after they've done their talking or negotiating.  They may have a verbal agreement in place, and then they draw it up which will eliminate the "deadline date."  And that may actually be how it usually works.  

Yeah, that’s how I’m guessing it happens. 

[thawv]

1 minute ago, TarzanJoeWallis said:

Yeah, that’s how I’m guessing it happens. 

That actually makes more sense than just making a written offer without a verbal agreement in place.  Unless they have a dollar range nailed down, and the team writes something up for them to sign.  In that case, it may not be the amount they are willing to sign for, or they may be fine with that. 

[CubinNY]

52 minutes ago, thawv said:

I'm assuming that a baseball contract is like every other contract in the business world.  I've written many contracts, and signed many contracts, and in no case was there ever not a time to accept the contract.  What this tpye of time frame is, is something that I don't know.  It could be 7 days.  It could be 30 days.  But not putting a deadline on accepting lets the player search for as long as he wants meanwhile the team making the offer is held hostage until they hear back from him.  Are they just going to wait 5 months to hear an answer?   

Lol

[Rob]

53 minutes ago, thawv said:

I'm assuming that a baseball contract is like every other contract in the business world.  I've written many contracts, and signed many contracts, and in no case was there ever not a time to accept the contract.  What this tpye of time frame is, is something that I don't know.  It could be 7 days.  It could be 30 days.  But not putting a deadline on accepting lets the player search for as long as he wants meanwhile the team making the offer is held hostage until they hear back from him.  Are they just going to wait 5 months to hear an answer?   

I have also written and signed many contracts. A great deal of them did not have a time to accept the contract.

Now, don't get me wrong -- there was always an implicit understanding that the offer would be revoked if somebody took too long to decide. But there were plenty of times an offer would sit out there for a few weeks before somebody decided to pull it.

Here, that isn't a concern. The posting window itself operates as a deadline. So there's no need for a team to look pushy and impose an additional deadline on top of that.

[thawv]

4 minutes ago, CubinNY said:

Lol

Keep reading the posts that followed.

[thawv]

1 minute ago, Rob said:

I have also written and signed many contracts. A great deal of them did not have a time to accept the contract.

Now, don't get me wrong -- there was always an implicit understanding that the offer would be revoked if somebody took too long to decide. But there were plenty of times an offer would sit out there for a few weeks before somebody decided to pull it.

Here, that isn't a concern. The posting window itself operates as a deadline. So there's no need for a team to look pushy and impose an additional deadline on top of that.

Nicely said.  Ok, in the event a team makes him an offer 5 days after he's posted, I would want a deadline much sooner that the posting expiration so that I can move on to another option instead of having to wait an additional 40 days. 

 

But after giving it some more thought, there's probably not a written contract offer until there's a verbal agreement in place.  Kind of an, "ok, put it in writing and we'll sign it" type of deal. 

[CubinNY]

17 minutes ago, thawv said:

Keep reading the posts that followed.

They. Have. A. Deadline. In. Place. Already. - From my understanding here is how it works. The agent gathers offers from interested clubs. Many times the clubs meet personally with the agent and player, but not always. The agent views the offers and discards those that aren’t what the player is looking for. The agent then goes back to the clubs, sometimes with player input and sometimes without (see Freddy Freeman), and begins negotiations with clubs. The clubs then give their final and best offer and the agent presents the offers to the player to decide. A club may say, “we are under a tight timeline so we need to know by X date”. To which an agent may agree or not ( see Nick Castellonos, Cubs negotiating). 
 

But if a club says you have x days to decide, the player either had no options or few options. 

Edited December 29, 2025 by CubinNY

[thawv]

3 minutes ago, CubinNY said:

They. Have. A. Deadline. In. Place. Already. - From my understanding here is how it works. The agent gathers offers from interested clubs. Many times the clubs meet personally with the agent and player, but not always. The agent views the offers and discards those that aren’t what the player is looking for. The agent then goes back to the clubs, sometimes with player input and sometimes without (see Freddy Freeman), and begins negotiations with clubs. The clubs then give their final and best offer and the agent presents the offers to the player to decide. A club may say, “we are under a tight timeline so we need to know by X date”. To which an agent may agree or not ( see Nick Castellonos, Cubs negotiating). 
 

But if a club says you have x days to decide, they player either had no options or few options. 

Interesting.  Thanks. 

[Illiterate Scholar]

There's also situations like the one the Cubs might currently be in where their top 3 FA choices are represented by the same agent.

[ILMindState]

https://nypost.com/2025/12/28/sports/japanese-star-tatsuya-imai-reveals-hes-yet-to-receive-mlb-offer-with-signing-deadline-days-away/

 

[CubinNY]

1 hour ago, ILMindState said:

https://nypost.com/2025/12/28/sports/japanese-star-tatsuya-imai-reveals-hes-yet-to-receive-mlb-offer-with-signing-deadline-days-away/

 

It’s the NY Post, but still.. 

[Tryptamine]

1 hour ago, ILMindState said:

https://nypost.com/2025/12/28/sports/japanese-star-tatsuya-imai-reveals-hes-yet-to-receive-mlb-offer-with-signing-deadline-days-away/

 

That almost feels like it can't be right. He has 3 days left to decide before the 24 hour window to get things completed prior to his deadline. If there haven't been an official offers, that's going to have to change in the next 12ish hours if they actually want any room to negotiation.

[Illiterate Scholar]

Reading the quotes, I'm not sure the url matches what he literally meant, especially when factoring in translation. But I bet Boras didn't love the openness and tried to clean it up at the end. 

[Jason Ross]

Yeah, I've assumed that quote is some sort of a translation issue. A "formal" and "informal" contract offer feels very easy to lose across languages.

[Hortonhearsawho]

23 minutes ago, Tryptamine said:

That almost feels like it can't be right. He has 3 days left to decide before the 24 hour window to get things completed prior to his deadline. If there haven't been an official offers, that's going to have to change in the next 12ish hours if they actually want any room to negotiation.

If you scroll all the way down you get this correction. So that title seems off.

 

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that Tatsuya Imai did not have any formal offers from MLB teams. It remains uncertain what level of offers the Japanese star currently has received.

[Bertz]

Formal offers are I believe full on contracts.  Or at least like a terms sheet.  You see this distinction used a lot for rage bait.  "The Mets didn't even make Pete Alonso a formal offer!"  Well sure but they talked extensively and there was an understanding they'd be willing to go to $100M it just never got formalized because both sides understood it wasn't going to get the job done.

[chibears55]

18 hours ago, Hortonhearsawho said:

They still need another infielder but 1B isn't a huge worry anymore. 

Might give Long an opportunity in ST 🤷