Roki Sasaki's agent blasts media over false Dodgers narratives

Roki Sasaki is the flavor of the moment in MLB free agency. As the hot stove heats up, so too have the rumors as to which team the coveted Japanese pitcher might sign with this offseason.

Of course, the Los Angeles Dodgers have been at the forefront of these rumors. They need to upgrade their starting rotation, they can provide endless endorsement opportunities, and they landed the last big-name arm to come over from Japan last offseason in Yoshinobu Yamamoto.

Granted, Sasaki is a different case than Yamamoto, as he will be part of the 2025 international amateur class. As such, the cost to sign him will be significantly lower, as it will be subject to the limitations of MLB's international bonus pool, which theoretically opens the door for smaller-market franchises to sign the 23-year-old flamethrower. It also thwarts the Dodgers' chances of offering him a competitive financial package, as they will have to likely break a few preexisting handshake commitments to international talent in order to reach the top of the bonus pool.

Roki Sasaki's agent says rumors of under-the-table Dodgers deal are 'poor sportsmanship'

Even after the announcement that he will be part of next year's international amateur class, it's still being treated as a foregone conclusion that Sasaki will land in Los Angeles – so much so, in fact, that front office executives have begun to speculate that Sasaki already has some sort of unwritten agreement to join the Dodgers.

It didn't help matters that former Cy Young Award winner Dallas Keuchel, who was Sasaki’s teammate on Chiba Lotte of Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan this year, told the New York Post earlier this month that he had "heard some rumblings about a done deal" between Sasaki and the Dodgers.

Amid allegations of a handshake agreement with the Dodgers, Sasaki’s agent, Joel Wolfe of Wasserman, decided to set the record straight Wednesday.

“While a bunch of executives who should know me better and do a lot of business with me insult my integrity by insinuating that I would be a part of some type of nefarious agreement,” Wolfe told Evan Drellich of The Athletic (subscription required), "in reality, this is just poor sportsmanship.”

Unwritten agreements with international amateur players are technically banned, but we all know they still happen routinely in Latin America. After all, if the agreements are unwritten, where is the proof that they even happened in the first place? It's a ban that's nearly impossible to enforce.

At the end of the day, even if Los Angeles can't offer him the most competitive financial package, don't be surprised if Sasaki ends up in Dodger Blue this offseason. The Dodgers just won the World Series, their competitive window doesn't appear to be closing anytime soon, and they already have Yamamoto and Shohei Ohtani in their clubhouse. That's a compelling enough argument for Sasaki to sign, with or without a handshake deal.

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