Moments after news that Japanese pitcher Roki Sasaki was set to be posted by the Chiba Lotte Marines, the Nippon Professional Baseball team he has played for in Japan, the World Series-champion Los Angeles Dodgers quickly emerged as the favorites to land the ace righthander.
So much so that ESPN's Buster Olney, after speaking with all 30 MLB general managers, said on an episode of Baseball Tonight earlier in November that "thirty out of thirty teams believe he's going to the Dodgers." Sasaki's agent Joel Wolfe, did not take kindly to such a stance from the league's executives, which has some believing the Dodgers already have a handshake agreement with Sasaki.
