Ranking Teruaki Sato's Top Landing Spots After Winning Japan's NPB Triple Crown

The inevitable became kind of official on Monday afternoon: Japan's newest slugging superstar is on his way to Major League Baseball. The Hanshin Tigers approved third baseman Teruaki Sato's request to be posted for MLB free agency.

Fresh off winning the Triple Crown with 39 home runs, 106 RBI and a .306 batting average, Sato enters a market in which coveted free-agent hitters are few and far between.

Needless to say, the interest level will be high with this one.

Sato won't officially get posted until shortly after the Japan Series ends, which will be played on more or less the same days as the World Series. Once the posting is official, though, the 45-day clock begins. (If posted players don't sign with an MLB team within that 45-day window, they are returned to their former team in NPB.)

Notably, according to MLB Trade Rumors' Mark Polishuk, if Sato remains unsigned when the collective bargaining agreement expires at 11:59 p.m. ET on Dec. 1 and an anticipated lockout begins, his 45-day posting window would pause until the lockout ends, leaving him whatever time remained to negotiate a deal.

Are teams going to wait until the new collective bargaining agreement is reached to make a Sato-sized splash, though? Or are we destined for a gigantic signing somewhere around Thanksgiving?

Also, how gigantic of a signing are we talking here? Which teams are most likely to be in the running to get Sato? And what position is he actually going to play in MLB?

We'll tackle the contract projection portion first before ranking his likeliest landing spots.

Projecting Teruaki Sato's Market in Free Agency

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In the coming days and months, you're going to hear a lot of comparisons between Teruaki Sato and Munetaka Murakami.

Over his final two seasons in Japan, Murakami homered in 6.5 percent of plate appearances, struck out in 28.8 percent of plate appearances and had a .950 fielding percentage at third base.

Sato's marks are 6.5, 27.0 and .956, respectively.

Sato is two years older than Murakami was when he signed with the White Sox, but he has also been a lefty-slugging, frequently-whiffing source of questionable defense at the hot corner.

If you think Sato is going to end up with a contract similar to Murakami's two-year, $34M deal, though, you might be sorely mistaken.

One year ago, MLB Trade Rumors offered a projection of eight years, $180M for Murakami. But that market never came together, as teams worried that the strikeouts and poor defense would outweigh the slugging and felt uncomfortable with a long-term deal.

Those teams are regretting that stance these days, though. And if Murakami was the litmus test for Sato, the latter should be headed for a much bigger payday.

Our Joel Reuter recently projected Sato to fetch $120M over six years. And in ranking Sato behind only Tarik Skubal in this year's class of free agents, MLBTR's Steve Adams said in September, "There aren't many viable nine-figure deal candidates on the market this winter, but Sato seems to have that kind of earning upside."

When trying to figure out which teams can afford to invest that much this winter, don't forget there's also a posting fee: 20 percent of the first $25M, 17.5 percent of the next $25M and 15 percent of anything beyond that.

If Reuter is correct with his $120M estimate, the winning bidder would also owe $19.875M to the Hanshin Tigers.

And—like it or not—the teams most likely to pay that type of fee to sign a top free agent are the same ones that we've grown accustomed to seeing pay a luxury tax in recent years.

Five Honorable Mentions

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Boston Red Sox: Giving Masataka Yoshida a five-year, $90M contract hasn't particularly gone according to plan for Boston. But is that going to deter them from signing the next star slugger from Japan? After scoring two runs in their embarrassing exit from the wild card round? They might prioritize Randy Arozarena, but they're at least going to kick the tires on signing Sato.

Los Angeles Angels: They won the Shohei Ohtani sweepstakes once upon a time, although that was a much less expensive investment at the time. They're also transitioning ownership from Arte Moreno to Stan Kroenke, which won't be official until early 2027. That makes it tough to guess at anything the Angels might do this winter. But they figure to have money to spend and a rather dire need for a left-handed bat with pop.

Philadelphia Phillies: They've spent a lot of money over the past six years, but this might be a bridge too far. The Phillies also already have a full-time DH on their hands in the form of Kyle Schwarber. Even if they do have the discretionary funds to do something major this offseason, they might not want to invest it in a guy who may or may not be able to play passable defense at a TBD position.

Pittsburgh Pirates: If Sato gets offered anything close to $120M, go ahead and take Pittsburgh out of the conversation. But if the big spenders are reluctant to give him six years out of the gates and want him to prove that his swing translates across the Pacific Ocean, the 2027 Pirates could be the 2026 White Sox. At any rate, they need to add some pop to a lineup that's losing Brandon Lowe, and they have a gaping hole at third base, if at least getting a chance at the hot corner is important to Sato.

Texas Rangers: Making it work financially might be tough, but it's kind of now or never for Texas with Nathan Eovaldi and MacKenzie Gore both a year away from free agency. And in each of the past three years, it's because they didn't have enough offense that they've sputtered to .500-ish records.

5. New York Yankees

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Combining Sato's left-handed power swing with that short porch in right field at Yankee Stadium could be a match made in heaven.

We don't have Statcast data on Sato's swings in NPB to be able to say how many home runs he would theoretically have at each ballpark, but we can pretty safely assume Yankee Stadium is at or near the top of the list.

Two big questions, though.

The first is: Where does he fit on defense?

If his glovework is passable at third base, beating Ryan McMahon for the starting job shouldn't be hard.

However, with a career .941 fielding percentage at the hot corner, that's questionable at best. And the Yankees already have a projected starting shortstop (George Lombard Jr.) who ranked dead last in fielding percentage among shortstops who logged at least 350 innings in 2026.

Adding another poor defender at third base would be a disaster waiting to happen. But with Ben Rice at first base, Giancarlo Stanton at DH and all three outfield spots pretty well spoken for, there's nowhere else to put him.

The second question is the money.

The Yankees already have a cash payroll of $273M, they've been reluctant to go north of $300M with their Opening Day payroll—much to the chagrin of a fanbase that remembers when it was virtually impossible to outspend this team—and they've got a bunch of holes to fill in that bullpen, including a possible $23.15M qualifying offer coming David Bednar's way.

We can't very well rule out the Yankees, but it doesn't seem likely.

4. Los Angeles Dodgers

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Fire is hot. Water is wet. And the Dodgers might sign one of the top free agents—from Japan, no less—on the market.

As was the case with the Yankees, though, we have to question where Sato would even fit with this deep-pocketed squad.

Third baseman Max Muncy is 36 years old. First baseman Freddie Freeman is 37. However, they're both signed through at least 2027 and missed a combined total of 22 games this past season. Can't very well plan on putting Sato at either corner infield spot, nor in right field where Kyle Tucker is the regular.

It's not like the DH spot is opening up any time soon, either, with Shohei Ohtani holding down the fort there for the foreseeable future.

And even if the Dodgers did want to bring in someone who could give each of those four left-handed sluggers the occasional day off, it hardly makes sense for it to be another left-handed slugger that they sign.

The Dodgers also already have a projected tax payroll of just a shade under $400M, which is tops in baseball by a wide margin.

While it wouldn't shock anyone if they embraced a tax bill of $200M in the process of signing Tarik Skubal, paying a $20M posting fee, a $20M salary and another $20M+ in luxury tax to get Sato would be excessive, even for them.

3. Chicago White Sox

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There were three MLB players who tallied at least 30 home runs and 190 strikeouts last season: Philadelphia's Kyle Schwarber and Chicago's Munetaka Murakami and Colson Montgomery.

What's one more, right?

In theory, they have plenty of room in the budget to sign Sato. The White Sox had an Opening Day payroll north of $180M in each of 2022 and 2023, but their projected payroll for next spring is just $121M, even after adding Luis Castillo's bloated contract at the trade deadline.

The White Sox also have a need at designated hitter, unless they think the fifth time's the charm with Andrew Benintendi. He remains under contract for one more season, with a $14.5 million base salary in 2027. But if they're serious about running it back again as a postseason team, the last 20 percent of that dead-weight contract shouldn't prevent them from pursuing Sato.

It probably doesn't hurt matters that they already have Murakami. (And bidets installed in the clubhouse.)

However, the White Sox have never signed a player (neither free agent nor extension) for more than $75M. And the three times they have gone to at least $70M—Benintendi, Yasmani Grandal and Yoán Moncada—each contract aged like milk.

It'd be a fun fit for a team that would be expected to lead the majors in both home runs and strikeouts in 2027. If it's as much of a bidding war as we expect, though, it's probably not in the cards for Chicago.

2. Toronto Blue Jays

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Dead last.

That's where the Blue Jays ranked in the majors in scoring in 2026, one year removed from almost winning the World Series.

If it hadn't been for the slugger they signed from Japan last offseason (Kazuma Okamoto), things would've been so much worse, as he led the team in both home runs and RBI by a wide margin.

Could they go back to that well for another big bat, this time of the left-handed variety?

With George Springer, Shane Bieber, Max Scherzer and the guys they already traded away no longer on the books, they do have quite a bit of money to play with, assuming a similar budget.

And with a current projected alignment of Davis Schneider in left field with Anthony Santander theoretically healthy enough to be the DH, there are certainly some holes to fill in this lineup.

There are other, non-Sato options out there, of course, most notably Randy Arozarena via free agency and/or Steven Kwan via trade. But the former will already be 32 by Opening Day and the latter does nothing to solve the problem Toronto had with slugging this season.

Signing Sato to play DH and perhaps occasionally man a corner outfield spot could be Toronto's path back to October baseball.

1. New York Mets

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At the moment, we don't know what Bo Bichette is going to do about his opt-out clause, which is kind of a huge offseason variable.

If he opts out, New York almost certainly has to be No. 1 on this list.

At that point, you're talking about an Opening Day lineup with Brett Baty at third base, Jorge Polanco at designated hitter and a Jared Young / Mark Vientos platoon at first base. Maybe top prospect Jefferson Rojas finds his way into the mix, but yikes.

If Bichette stays with the Mets for at least one more $42M season, though, they're already looking at a cash payroll of almost $260M—and with work to be done this winter on that pitching staff.

Either way, there's a good chance they're going to win the Tarik Skubal sweepstakes, in which case that payroll spikes to roughly $300M if Bichette stays.

However, what else is new for Steve Cohen, who has greenlit an Opening Day payroll of at least $320M in each of the past four years?

And after a season in which they got a sub-.700 OPS from every non-outfield spot in their lineup—after letting Pete Alonso walk and watching him mash 43 home runs in Baltimore—Cohen just might dig even deeper into that checkbook than usual.