Japan’s Yusei Kikuchi (32, Toronto Blue Jays) overturned the undervaluation.
‘MLB Trade Rumors (MLBTR)’, which covers major league news, published an article on the 23rd (Korean time) highlighting two starting pitchers who shined in Toronto.토스카지노
Toronto ranked 3rd in the American League East Division this season and advanced to the postseason as 2nd place in the wild card. However, they were eliminated from fall baseball early after losing to Minnesota.
The media began by saying, “It seems somewhat surprising that the 2023 Toronto squad achieved the same performance as last year despite its shortcomings. Even though the pitcher who showed the best performance last season was missing from the starting lineup, the starting rotation was strong.”
He continued, “Veteran left-hander Ryu Hyun-jin returned healthy and made 11 appearances on the mound, and Kevin Gausman had an excellent season overall as the ace. Jose Berrios and Kikuchi put in the most effort.”
The media highly praised Kikuchi’s performance here. “It was a disastrous contract,” he recalled. “Kikuchi turned things around in 2023. Even though his strikeout rate fell to 25.9%, Kikuchi showed significant improvement. His walk rate was cut in half, and his barrel batting rate was halved in 2022.” “It was the worst at 14.8% last year, but we reduced it to 9% this season,” he praised.
Alec Manoa, who won 16 games last year and finished third in Cy Young Award voting, was left out of the starting rotation after a severe slump, putting Toronto in an emergency situation. However, other starters such as Gausman, Chris Bassett, Berrios, and Kikuchi made up for this and continued the season.
In particular, he gave a thumbs up to Kikuchi’s performance, which erased all the disappointments from last season.
Kikuchi succeeded in advancing to the Major League wearing a Seattle uniform in 2019. He signed a seven-year, up to $109 million contract with Seattle. He had three years and $43 million guaranteed. Kikuchi, who qualified as a free agent after Seattle did not exercise the team option at the end of the 2021 season, moved to Toronto. He signed a three-year, $36 million (approximately 48.6 billion won) contract.
Last year, the first year of his transfer, he appeared in 32 games (20 starts) and showed below expectations with 100⅔ innings, 6 wins, 7 losses, and an average ERA of 5.19.
But he was different this year. He had a career-high season, five seasons after his big league debut, with 11 wins, 6 losses, 181 strikeouts and a 3.86 earned run average in 32 games, 167⅔ innings. Along with achieving his first 10 wins, it was the season in which he played the most innings.
He now has one year left on his contract with Toronto. Attention is focused on what Kikuchi, who overturned the undervaluation, will show next year.