MLB News and Rumors

Andruw Jones will play in Japan next year. The one time MLB star has reportedly signed a deal worth $ 3.6 million to play for the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles.
Jones is guaranteed the money from the Golden Eagles, something he would not have been assured of had he accepted a deal stateside. Last year the 35-year-old hit .197/.294/.408 but did hit 14 home runs and drove in 34 RBI in 233 at-bats. Jones spent the last two seasons with the New York Yankees.
Ten Gold Glove awards and 434 home runs highlight the time Jones played in the United States. His best season came in 2005 when he hit 51 home runs and drove in 128 runs for the Atlanta Braves. He played for the Braves from 1996 to 2007 before signing with the Los Angles Dodgers. He also played for the Texas Rangers and Chicago White Sox.

Related Posts:

• Wife of Andruw Jones files for divorce
• Andruw Jones arrested for battery
• Andruw Jones arrested for battery
• Yankees re-sign OF Andruw Jones
• Red Sox wooing Andruw Jones from Yankees?

Japanese pitcher Shohei Otani will forgo playing in Japan to play in the United StatesJapanese high school phenom pitcher Shohei Otani will forgo playing professional baseball in Japan, in hopes to have a career in Major League Baseball. Otani was expected to be chosen first in Thursday’s amateur draft in Japan. Shohei Otani is just 18-years-old and has always dreamed of playing baseball professionally in the United States.Via ESPN:The 18-year-old Otani said “I think I will start in the minor leagues but I want to challenge in the majors. It’s been my dream since entering high school.Shohei Otani is a 6-foot-4 right-hander who can dial-up his fastball as high as 100 mph. He has been scouted by several major league teams including the Los Angeles Dodgers and Boston Red Sox. If Otani signs with a major league team, he would become the first top draft pick to make the jump from a Japanese high school to the United States.The post Japanese high school pitcher will enter MLB draft appeared first on Rea

Related Posts:

• Gerrit Cole’s major league debut will come against his girlfriend’s brother
• Top MLB Draft prospect tests positive for Adderall
• 5 most decadent menu items at Major League parks
• Despite struggles Cubs will keep Darwin Barney at major league level
• Brennan Boesch Signs Major League Deal With Yankees Worth $1.5 Million Plus Incentives

Free-agent right-hander Brad Penny is headed to Japan.

Penny agreed Sunday to a one-year, $ 4 million contract with the Softbank Hawks, according to a major-league source.

The deal, which includes $ 3.5 million in incentives and a $ 4.5 million mutual option for 2013, is the largest ever given to an American pitcher in his first contract with a Japanese team, the source said.

Penny, 33, went 11-11 with a 5.30 ERA last season for the Detroit Tigers and is 119-99 with a 4.23 ERA lifetime. He began his 12-year career with the Florida Marlins and later played for the Los Angeles Dodgers, Boston Red Sox, San Francisco Giants and St. Louis Cardinals.

Related Posts:

• Ex-MLB pitcher Penny signs with Softbank Hawks
• RHP Brad Lidge, Nationals agree to 1-year deal
• Brad Penny, V-Mart get in argument midgame
• Tigers Add Brad Penny for Rotation Depth
• Brad Ziegler: The Best Pitcher You’ve Never Heard Of

Oakland Athletics pitcher Dallas Braden won’t be traveling to Japan with the team to start off the season against the Seattle Mariners, but after being out for most of last year, Braden is happy that he has the chance to be ready to pitch for the team when it returns to the States.

Braden, who pitched the 19^th perfect game in MLB history back in May of 2010 against the Tampa Bay Rays, is slated to pitch 25 fastballs off a mound Monday for the first time since having shoulder surgery last May, according to MLB.com.

“I feel great,” he said, according to the site. “I feel really strong. It’s nice to know all the hard work we put into the offseason and the days you didn’t want to get up and the days you didn’t want to push through, you now understand why it’s important to do so.”

MLB.com notes that “a realistic time frame” for Braden’s return may be “more like mid-April.”

Let the rumors come to you. Follow Scoop du Jour on Twitter or Facebook.

Related Posts:

• Athletics’ Braden missing trip to Japan
• Nationals trying to add Athletics’ Gio Gonzalez
• More offers coming for Athletics’ Gio Gonzalez?
• More offers coming for Athletics’ Gio Gonzalez?
• DFA’ed pitcher watches A’s game from stands

The Softbank Hawks of Japan’s Pacific League have signed former major league pitcher Brad Penny to a one-year contract.

Softbank announced the signing of free agent Penny on its website Sunday

The 33-year-old right-hander is expected to arrive in Japan on Wednesday. Financial terms of the deal were not released.

Penny went 11-11 last season for the Detroit Tigers with a 5.30 ERA and 74 strikeouts in 31 games. Penny has a 119-99 record and a 4.23 ERA over a 12-year major league career that included stints with the Florida Marlins, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Boston Red Sox, the San Francisco Giants and the St. Louis Cardinals.

Related Posts:

• Brad Penny to pitch in Japan
• Ex-MLB outfielder Pena signs with Softbank Hawks
• Brennan Boesch Signs Major League Deal With Yankees Worth $1.5 Million Plus Incentives
• Scott Proctor signs minor league deal with Giants
• Andy Pettitte signs minor league deal with Yankees

Oakland Athletics pitcher Dallas Braden won’t be traveling to Japan with the team to start off the season against the Seattle Mariners, but after being out for most of last year, Braden is happy that he has the chance to be ready to pitch for the team when it returns to the States.

Braden, who pitched the 19^th perfect game in MLB history back in May of 2010 against the Tampa Bay Rays, is slated to pitch 25 fastballs off a mound Monday for the first time since having shoulder surgery last May, according to MLB.com.

“I feel great,” he said, according to the site. “I feel really strong. It’s nice to know all the hard work we put into the offseason and the days you didn’t want to get up and the days you didn’t want to push through, you now understand why it’s important to do so.”

MLB.com notes that “a realistic time frame” for Braden’s return may be “more like mid-April.”

Let the rumors come to you. Follow Scoop du Jour on Twitter or Facebook.

Related Posts:

• Athletics’ Braden missing trip to Japan
• Manny Ramirez joining Athletics or Orioles?
• Nationals trying to add Athletics’ Gio Gonzalez
• More offers coming for Athletics’ Gio Gonzalez?
• More offers coming for Athletics’ Gio Gonzalez?

Clay Daniel remembers the first time he saw Yu Darvish in person. It was at a 2002 tryout on an island off the coast of Japan, when the lanky right-hander, who signed a six-year, 60-million deal with the Texas Rangers on Wednesday, was only 16.

“He was a fungo bat, about 6 feet 4 and 160 pounds, and he was only throwing 85-88 mph,” said Daniel, then the Angels’ international scouting director. “He was still a baby, but you could tell he had a chance to be something special.”

Dodgers special advisor Tom Lasorda had a similar reaction when he saw Darvish in the 2004 Koshien National High School Baseball Championships as a senior in 2004.

“I fell in love with him,” Lasorda said. “Wow, he had a great arm. I would have signed him on the spot.”

Both came away from those early Darvish dabblings feeling jilted, like a kid looking through a store display window at a shiny toy he couldn’t have.

Daniel saw Darvish pitch about a dozen times as an amateur, and he told the pitcher’s family the Angels were willing to offer a lucrative bonus to lure him to the United States.

But in Japan, it is considered an affront to the nation for a star high school player to bypass the professional leagues there and go directly to the U.S., so Daniel’s recruiting pitch fell on deaf ears.

“It would have taken millions of dollars, an astronomical amount, to get him then,” said Daniel, now a major league scout for the Arizona Diamondbacks. “But his father wasn’t going to have any of that.”

Lasorda went so far as to invite Darvish and his father, Farsad, who is of Iranian descent, and his mother, Ikuyo, who is Japanese, to his hotel suite, an invitation that was accepted. But he knew the odds of convincing the pitcher to sign were “about a 100 to 1.”

“He had a little bit of a thought about coming over, but he wanted to stay,” Lasorda said. “Those teams over there, if they want that kid, they will not let him leave the country.”

The Dodgers had been scouting Darvish since he was 15.

“There’s this misconception that we start learning about players when they’re ready to come to the U.S.,” said Acey Kohrogi, the team’s director of Asian operations. “Actually, we’ve already known about them for a long time.”

Now, of course, everyone knows about Darvish, who went on to star for the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters and is being touted as the best Japanese pitcher to come to the U.S.

The Rangers paid Nippon 51.7 million for the right to negotiate with Darvish, and with Wednesday’s deal, they have invested 111.7 million in the 25-year-old with a wide array of off-speed pitches to go with his 95-mph fastball.

The Angels, who play the Rangers 18 or 19 times a year, will have to contend with an ace right-hander who could neutralize their predominantly right-handed-hitting lineup.

“He had the stuff, and his feel for the strike zone was pretty special,” Daniel said. “He made his mark in Japan. Now he has a chance to make his mark here.”

Related Posts:

• Angels, Dodgers see Yu Darvish slip away

Oakland Athletics manager Bob Melvin is looking forward to opening Major League Baseball’s 2012 season in Japan even if his team doesn’t re-sign free agent Hideki Matsui.

The Athletics and Seattle Mariners open the regular season with a two-game series at Tokyo Dome on March 28-29. Many hoped the series would feature a showdown between Matsui and countryman Ichiro Suzuki, but Melvin said the A’s likely wont be re-signing the 37-year-old Matsui.

Melvin said ”Matsui was a great fit for us last year and we all loved having him on our team, but this year it doesn’t look like a fit for us based on the personnel we have going forward.”

Related Posts:

• Major League Baseball reacts to Alex Rodriguez scandal
• 5 most decadent menu items at Major League parks
• Hideki Matsui retires from baseball
• Yankees contact Hideki Matsui about open DH job
• Yankees contact Hideki Matsui about open DH job