Bid for Yu Darvish to be accepted by Tuesday, expected to set record -MLB Update
The Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters of the Japanese baseball league is expected to accept the posting bid for Japanese pitching sensation, Yu Darvish, who has rumbled the Major League Baseball (MLB) with his comeback into the American national league as teams
fight to land the player for the upcoming 2012 regular season.
The winning post bid for Darvish is reported to top the former highest bid by the Boston Red Sox who paid $51, 111, 111 for the exclusive negotiating rights in November of 2006 to Daisuke Matsuzaka. It is still not clear at the moment what the highest bid
from the MLB teams are at the moment, but Tuesday has been set as the date of announcement by the Nippon-Ham Fighters.
The Boston Red Sox was reported to be a frontrunner once again for the Japanese player, but according to new general manager, Ben Cherington, he can say nothing for certain, regarding it something as time based.
“I’m not sure the timing this offseason puts us in a position to be the most aggressive team,’’ Cherington said, according to The Boston Globe newspaper. “But he’s a good pitcher and we have a lot of respect for him. We’ll certainly discuss it and figure
out if a (bid) makes sense.”
According to some sources, the highest bid for Darvish is not higher than the one for Matsuzaka in the past but is certainly in the $40 million plus range.
Toronto Blue Jays are the leading team in the MLB, learned by sources close to the team but when contacted on the situation, they did not describe anything as official and on the record.
Darvish had an 18-6 record in the 2011 MLB regular season, which made him the highest paid player in Japan, along with a 1.44 earned-run average and a league topping 276 strikeouts.
The team that is announced to be the winner in terms of the bid being accepted by Yu Darvish’s Japanese team, will have 30 days in order to negotiate with the team for a length of 30 days after which a final decision must be announced by both stakeholders.
If negotiations are unsuccessful, the bid will be refunded.
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