CJ Garcia
Since Roki Sasaki caught national attention as a rising phenom in Japan in 2021 at 19 years of age, the MLB world has been waiting for the flame-throwing right-hander to be posted for an MLB team to sign.
In his first professional season in the NPB, Sasaki posted a 1.84 ERA over 16 starts while throwing a fastball that routinely hovered over 100 MPH. To put Roki’s dominance into perspective, he averaged 2.02 ERA, 11.4 K/9, 2.0 BB/9, and 6 H/9 over four years.
Part of what makes Sasaki a phenom is his absurd arsenal. His fastball is incredibly dynamic, as shown in his 2023 WBC start against Mexico, where his fastball AVERAGED 100.5 MPH,17.1 inches of Induced Vertical Break (IVB), and 12.3 inches of horizontal break.
Over his NPB career, I would grade his fastball at 70/80, accounting for the dip in velocity (which I will get into later). His explosive fastball will carry over in the MLB, and its natural characteristics could make him dominant from very early in his career.
Sasaki’s marquee pitch is his devastating splitter, which is personally the best pitch I have ever seen and an EASY 80-grade pitch, throwing it 28% of the time in the 2024 season; the splitter averaged 88 MPH, CSW% 35%, and a Strike% of 53%.
The splitter is a staple of Japanese pitchers’ arsenals, but Sasaki’s just different. Depending on the hitter’s handedness, Roki throws the pitch with either a gyro spin or a more knuckling-cutting action. Notably, Sasaki throws a splitter with more cutting action against right-handed hitters, alters the orientation of the pitch against left-handed hitters, and fades the pitch to his arm side.
His splitter has become much sharper than it was in the past and, as I previously mentioned, carries a knuckling effect. Sasaki’s splitter limits contact. In the 2022 and 2023 seasons, it got ground balls at a 71% clip and remained impressive in 2024 at a 57% ground ball rate. Sasaki’s splitter, which dives, cuts, and tumbles, is the perfect pitch to pair with his explosive fastball with rise and run. Roki Sasaki’s splitter is an easy 80/80 pitch.
The developing pitch for Sasaki is the slider, which is thrown 26% of the time, carrying a CSW% of 39% and a Strike% of 62%. It is still a developing pitch, so inconsistency in the shape of the pitch is expected, but Roki has shown he can throw sharp sliders for chase and strikes and slower sliders that he routinely spots for strikes.
My assumption is that the Dodgers will have Sasaki develop a sharper slider than could playoff of both his splitter and fastball, which could become a whiff and put-away pitch. His slower sliders that he threw in 2024 were between 83-85 MPH with a 40.7% whiff rate. In 2023, the pitch ranged between 87-89 MPH with a 49% whiff rate, and I expect the Dodgers to develop this pitch with that shape.
In my opinion, it is currently a 65/80 grade pitch, and it could be a 70-grade pitch before he throws a regular-season pitch for the Dodgers.
Roki Sasaki is going to be an absolute treat to watch. At 23, he has the makeup to be the best pitcher in baseball. He is young, has unreal amounts of raw talent, and is coming to the Dodgers as a player who can be molded in our system.
A big concern was the 2.5 MPH dip in Sasaki’s fastball, but according to Lance Brozdowksi, this dip could be explained fully by a change in mechanics. Lance argues that the noticeable 6-inch extension increase on Sasaki’s stride could explain the downtick in mechanics. When I watched the video myself, I realized that the over-extension is essentially causing Roki to lose his base, where his power comes from, to be able to throw 100+ MPH.
As we found out through The Athletic article, Sasaki gave teams work to see how they could fix his dip in fastball velocity, and Lance’s overextension was at the forefront of that. With a flame thrower with a long and thin frame, the Dodgers will undoubtedly focus on optimizing Sasaki’s mechanics for health and performance.
Roki has the ability to be the best pitcher in all of baseball. If he refines what needs to be and continues to develop, Roki Sasaki’s dominance might take over the league very soon. As he makes his mark in the MLB, “The Monster of the Reiwa Era” will do it at least for the next 6 years in Dodger blue.
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