The Los Angeles Dodgers have signed three of Japan’s biggest talents over the past couple of offseasons, bringing in Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Roki Sasaki and Shohei Ohtani in during free agency.
This season, though, one of Japan’s top pitchers, Tatsuya Imai, has stated he wants to avoid joining the Dodgers and beat them to become a world champion.
Imai has spent the last nine seasons playing professionally in Japan, and is set to join MLB after the Saitama Seibu Lions posted him earlier in the offseason.
“Of course, I’d enjoy playing alongside Ohtani, Yamamoto, and Sasaki,” Imai said to former MLB starter Daisuke Matsuzaka on “Hodo Station”, “but winning against a team like that and becoming a world champion would be the most valuable thing in my life.