Texas Rangers had their eyes on Yu Darvish for years – MLB News
Days after the Japanese pitcher Yu Darvish was signed by the Texas Rangers, the exceptional talent is still attracting the media spot-light, thanks to the expectations he elicits. The club’s co-owner Ray Davis admitted on Friday, January 20, that his team
was pursuing the player for quite a while now.
He also revealed that general manager Jon Daniels, president Nolan Ryan and others were actually given a long presentation about the player. That could have enormously influenced the decision of the Texas Rangers to aggressively pursue the deal with the
player.
"We filled them in with an in-depth presentation," Daniels said. "We told them we had done our due diligence and why we felt this was a right fit for us. They were on board with it. They went the extra mile on this."
The player is expected to be introduced later in the day, something that the excited fans are anticipating with gusto. It is important to recall that the Rangers had the deadline of Wednesday to sign the player.
With the choices in abundance, and therefore a bit difficult to pick up one for the Rangers, the club opted for Yu Darvish with a $60 million deal for six years.
Daniels also brought to fore that which was largely unknown. The deal was in the making for years ever since Daniels had become the general manager back in 2005. Since then they had an eye on this scintillating pitcher out of many other talented Japanese
players.
"We had some scouts watching the World Baseball Classic, and they saw Japan play," Daniels said. "They came back and said, 'There are some really interesting players there, and they play a good brand of baseball.'"
Yu Darvish’s arrival in the team is indeed a good omen for the Rangers. He is being tipped as one of the strong additions in the pitching line-up, allowing the team a space to manoeuvre with less difficulty when it comes to defence. With Yu Darvish now a
part of the Rangers, other teams will be on the back-foot to plan out a strategy against the dynamic pitcher.
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