Seattle Mariners president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto said this week that the club wants to get back in the mix for Japanese free agents, and that alone is a meaningful shift.
Speaking Tuesday at the MLB GM meetings, Dipoto told Adam Jude of the Seattle Times, “There are a certain number of markets in MLB that are built out to invite players from the Asian leagues, and we’re one of them,” Mariners president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto said Tuesday at the MLB GM meetings. “I would love to get back into that market because we’ve been out for a while, but it hasn’t been due to a lack of effort.”
That’s the kind of comment Mariners fans have been waiting to hear. Seattle has been out of the Japanese free-agent game for too long, and Dipoto’s remarks at least signal that the organization knows it.
This winter’s class includes several Japanese players who have been posted, among them slugger Teruaki Sato. Still, the name that seems more likely to be on Seattle’s radar is Seiya Suzuki, who is available after a successful five-year run with the Chicago Cubs.
The Mariners have not signed a Japanese free agent since Yusei Kikuchi, whom they brought over before the 2019 season. That stretch is a long one, especially when compared with the Dodgers’ recent run in the market.
Los Angeles signed Shohei Ohtani in free agency and also landed Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Roki Sasaki from NPB. The Toronto Blue Jays have also jumped into the conversation, landing Kazuma Okamoto and staying involved with other Japanese players this offseason.
Seattle’s history in Japan has been real, even if it feels distant now. The Mariners previously signed Kaz Sasaki and Ichiro Suzuki, and both went on to win the American League Rookie of the Year Award, in 2000 and 2001.
Ichiro also won the MVP in 2001 and was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2025. The club also added Kenji Johjima, Shigetoshi Hasegawa and Munenori Kawasaki, though those moves all came at least 15 years ago.
There’s more to this than just adding another bat or arm. A stronger push back into Japan would widen Seattle’s talent pool, and it would also help the team’s international brand. If that kind of presence eventually translates into more sponsorship dollars and more money, it could open up new possibilities in free agency, too.
Whether the Mariners actually land Sato or Suzuki this year is another question. The bigger takeaway is simpler: they’re talking about Japan again, and that’s a step in the right direction.
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