One more take on Roki Sasaki and looking at Santander's Rogers Centre numbers

When Japanese right-handed pitcher Roki Sasaki signed as an international amateur with the Los Angeles Dodgers, baseball’s defending World Series winners got a top pitcher for a very modest signing amount.

The rich got richer.

That angered some fans who speculated that the Dodgers had some sort of handshake agreement to add Sasaki all along. I don’t know about that, but the industry seemed to expect the Dodgers to get him months ago and they did.

What troubled me about the team recruitment of Sasaki was his “homework assignment” for various clubs during the recruiting process. What he asked teams to do before meeting with him. And that was to assess why his fastball lost some velocity in Japan during the 2024 season and how they would fix that.

I don’t know how many teams completed their homework assignment, but clearly some teams went deep into possibly helping the pitcher fix his fastball and did not even get him on their team. That sounds to me like Sasaki and his camp crossed a line here or pushed an envelope a step or two too far. Tell me how I can be better so I can take that to my new team and stay good, he seemed to be saying.

Said one front office exec who was not identified: “Hey man, you’re asking for some things that get beyond that line of proprietary. It did kind of get to that line a little bit where you’re like, ‘Really?’ But you got to make a decision and then kind of put your best foot forward.”

I say what Sasaki and his reps did crossed a line. He should not be able to take the expertise from one team’s staff and bring it back to the Dodgers now that we know his 2025 destination. Teams had little choice but to try and help him, knowing he might never play for them.

I say that is crossing a line, but the line is obviously blurred and there is nothing officially a team could do when a player asks for such information. And heck it could be the Dodgers had the best presentation anyway regarding that specific information. They are a pretty smart organization obviously.

But this was surely a grey area and leaves a bad taste with some in the sport.

More on Tony Taters to Toronto: This week, switch-hitting outfielder Anthony Santander, in the O’s organization since Dec. 8, 2016, left to sign via free agency for five years with the Toronto Blue Jays.

The slugger who was third in the majors with 44 homers last year, is headed north of the border where he may be bashing a bunch of homers in a ballpark that several O’s batters have found to their liking over the past few years.

The 2024 Orioles hit 16 homers in seven games at Rogers Centre and Santander hit four of those homers. He went 7-for-29 (.241) at Rogers Centre with the four homers, two doubles and seven RBIs. He produced an OPS of .991 in that ballpark.

The 2023 Orioles averaged 6.29 runs per game in Toronto with eight homers and 25 extra-base hits in seven games, batting .293 with an .808 OPS at Rogers Centre. Santander hit two homers at the park in 2023.

The six homers he’s hit the past two seasons north of the border are his only career home runs at Rogers Centre. His career numbers there are not great, batting .194/.275/.398/.673 in 27 games with six home runs and 16 RBIs.

After signing his five-year deal for $92.5 million, Santander could wind up batting fourth in a potent lineup after George Springer, Bo Bichette and Vlad Guerrero Jr. His deal includes an opt-out after the third year, his age 32 season, but Toronto can void that by adding a sixth year onto his deal for 2030.