Breaking news: Ken Rosenthal reports Japanese right-handed Masahiro Tanaka has signed with the New York Yankees. Tanaka signed for 7 years at 155 million, with an opt out cause after the forth year. The Yankees will additionally pay 20 million to Tanaka’s old team, the Rakuten Golden Eagles as the posting fee.
According to David Kaplan, the Cubs were runner up and not ready to win hurt their chances of signing Tanaka. Kaplan also says the Cubs offer was around 7 years at 155 million. The Dodgers did not go to that level.
The Cubs went all the way to the end, but not being highly Japanese populated and years away from contending, doomed the Cubs.
Now that the Tanaka sweepstakes is over, where do the Cubs turn now? The Cubs off-season will be a fail now and there’s no way the Cubs can turn it around. Tanaka is one player they heavily relied on and they didn’t sign him. There’s no other free agents that can turn this Winter around. The Cubs played all their cards into one player and lost the hand. The Cubs have no interest in the three best starting pitchers on the open market … Matt Garza, Ervin Santana and Ubaldo Jimenez.
One player the Cubs have interest in again is Paul Maholm as the 4th or 5th starter. Even if the Cubs were to sign Maholm, it’s not a block buster signing.
The Cubs tried, but in the end Theo Epstein lost out on his prize.
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