Sources: Tomoyuki Sugano heading to MLB after Japanese career

Right-hander Tomoyuki Sugano, the most successful Japanese pitcher of his generation to have spent his whole career in Nippon Professional Baseball, will come to Major League Baseball as an international free agent this winter, sources told ESPN.

Sugano, who turns 35 in a week, is in the midst of a renaissance season that has seen him post a 1.67 ERA over 24 starts for the Central League champion Yomiuri Giants. He is a two-time winner of the Sawamura Award -- the equivalent of the Cy Young -- two-time Central League MVP and four-time ERA champion, and his reemergence paved the way for him to finally reach MLB.

In 2020, the Yomiuri Giants posted Sugano, and he was expected to sign with a big league team. He never reached an agreement before the posting deadline expired, though, and wound up returning to Tokyo, where his uncle, legendary Giants manager Tatsunori Hara, continued to lead the team.

Hara retired before this season, and Sugano has pitched exceptionally for Shinnosuke Abe, the Giants' longtime catcher to whom Sugano threw for years. This season, Sugano has averaged 92 mph with his four-seam fastball and relied on a two-seamer. He uses both an 82 mph slider and an 87 mph cutter about 20% of the time, and he can bury a splitter at 86 mph and loop in a curveball at 77. Sugano, according to DeltaGraphs, has positive run values on all six pitches this season.

That six-pitch mix has flummoxed NPB hitters. Only Hiroto Takahashi, Chunichi's 22-year-old ace who is expected to join MLB down the road, has a better ERA, at 1.38. What Sugano lacks in velocity he has made up for in command and pitchability. Over 156⅔ innings this season, Sugano has walked only 16 and allowed just six home runs -- in a league with a home run rate that is half of MLB's -- while striking out 111.

Unlike players who are posted, international free agents have no restrictions on their signing. Players in NPB earn the right to international free agency after nine seasons. Sugano has spent a dozen years with the Giants, going 136-75, including a league-high win total at 15-3 this year, and he is still primed to pitch for Yomiuri in the Central Climax Series. He led the Central League in ERA four times, first as an MVP in 2014 and then three consecutive years from 2016 to 2018. He also was an MVP in 2020.

Almost all the best peers of Sugano's generation have already gone to MLB, including  Shohei Ohtani, Yu Darvish, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Masahiro Tanaka, Kodai Senga, Kenta Maeda, Yusei Kikuchi and Shota Imanaga. At 6-foot-1 and 210 pounds, Sugano stayed healthy this season and more than doubled his inning output after throwing 77⅔ last year.

The starting pitching market this winter is shaping up as strong, led by Corbin Burnes, reigning National League Cy Young winner Blake Snell, left-hander Max Fried and right-hander Jack Flaherty. If the Chiba Lotte Mariners decide to post Roki Sasaki, the 22-year-old fireball-throwing right-hander, the sweepstakes for his services will draw perhaps every team in MLB, with restrictions on his bonus making him a bargain in the same way Ohtani was before hitting free agency.

Kikuchi has been among the best pitchers in baseball in the second half, while Luis Severino, Nick Pivetta and Nathan Eovaldi all will have healthy interest. Sean Manaea,  Nick Martinez and Michael Wacha could opt out of their deals, and  Shane Bieber and Walker Buehler are attractive pillow contract options.