Spring Training is alive and well and it’s so close that we can almost taste it. Baseball is in the air and it feels so great to see. With Spring Training Games set to begin in eight days, the anticipation for the Opening Day is getting closer and closer.

For the Los Angeles Dodgers and Chicago Cubs, they’ll begin their season in Japan. They’ll pitch in the Tokyo series, which will be great for that country and for baseball fans all over the world. Furthermore, the starters have been named for the first game of the series, in what will be pretty historic.

Opening Starters Named 

Shohei Ohtani is royalty in the country of Japan. It will be quite the moment when he takes his first at bat as a member of the Dodgers. But he is not the only Japanese born player playing in this game. There is Seiya Suzuki and Hyeseong Kim, but this series is highlighted by the pitching.

For the first game of this amazing series, the Cubs have named Shota Imanaga as their starter and the Dodgers have named Yoshinobu Yamamoto as their starter. Both are Japanese natives and both played key roles in their respective seasons. Imanaga was a stellar rookie for the Cubs last season, further bolstering their rotation. Yamamoto was hurt, but came back strong. Not to mention, he is the highest paid pitcher in the game of baseball. But these pitchers starting has history to it.

The list of Japanese pitchers to start a game for an MLB team in Japan is small. The last pitcher to start a game was Yusei Kikuchi (2019), and then in 2008 with Hideki Okajmia and Daisuke Matsuzaka. Also, the Dodgers have also said that Roki Sasaki will plan to pitch in this series, given the way Spring Training goes. That’s a lot of tremendous talent that just joined the big leagues heading back to Japan and showcasing it for their country. Now that the starters are named, let’s take a dive into these pitchers and what’s exciting to watch about them.

Breaking Down the Matchup

The Cubs landed a gem in Imanaga and at such a bargain of a contract. Imanaga took the league by storm and truly emerged as the front line starter for the Cubs. He was such a gem, especially when Justin Steele went down with his injury.

Imanaga finished the year with a 2.91 ERA and a 1.02 WHIP. He did finish with 174 strikeouts and in the 67th percentile for his strikeout rate. Imanaga does have impeccable command and finished in the 97th percentile for his walk rate and does a good job at getting batters to chase.

Imanaga has quite the arsenal of pitches he uses but relies on the four seam fastball the most. Weirdly enough, his changeup was only thrown to right handed batters. His best pitch was far and away his split finger, generating a 43% whiff rate and was his best put away pitch. He was an electrifying presence on the mound, but so was Yamamoto.

The World Series Champion had quite the start. He started out the year slow and unfortunately got hurt, which slowed down his progression. He did have good results, as he had a 3.00 ERA and a 1.11 WHIP. Like Imanaga, he had good command of the baseball, having a walks percentage of 6%. In addition, he had a nose for the zone and finished in the 85th percentile for strikeout percentage.

He has an arsenal of pitches, but truly relies on three. He does bring the four seam fastball to the table and follows it up with the split finger. Yamamoto had a .170 batting average against with that pitch and also saw it generate a whiff rate of 38%.

Both of these pitchers are similar in a lot of ways and to see them go head to head will be a delight for all baseball fans.