Check here for our Top 10 Prospects in 2023

The year has just begun, and yet we can think of at least ten players for whom the writing is on the wall: either put up good numbers in 2023 or prepare to find a new career. OK, that might be a little extreme, but with roughly 10 players coming in every offseason (draft + free agent acquisitions), you know the team is going to have to clear out some of the dead weight.

Here are our candidates… guys we hope will return to past glory years or finally reach their potential in 2023.

10) Kento Itohara, IF

Hard to believe a 30-year-old who has averaged 112 GP and a .696 OPS while playing middle infield is in danger of losing his job. But here we are. With the change in management, the team appears to be placing a heavier emphasis on defensive play. Itohara has started most of his games at second, where his UZR has been ranked dead-last in all of NPB. Itohara has also lost two important pieces of his game in the last two seasons: OBP (.390 in 2018 but just .307 last year) and clutch hitting (.326 in 2020 but .206 last year). His “power” numbers have also declined. Where Itohara used to have solid gap power (29 doubles in 2018), he has now become a slap hitter (12 doubles in 2022). Takumu Nakano has been slotted in as the everyday second baseman and Teruaki Sato is likely to start at the hot corner (Itohara’s secondary position, but for which he truly lacks power), so what will become of this scrappy little guy? My guess is pinch-hitting this year and maybe a trade or active draft bait mid-year.

9) Keisuke Kobayashi, RHP

The truth of the matter is, Kobayashi came to the Tigers via a trade. We gave up lefty Yuya Iida, who did not accomplish much for us after we picked him up for Ryoma Matsuda, who did not do much for us, either. With a decent fastball and a pretty solid forkball, Kobayashi has been expected to find his way into the bullpen but has not found consistency or health in his 3 seasons with the Tigers (only 35 top-squad innings across that stretch). Something tells me, with the glut of talent the Tigers have just raring for a chance to crack the top squad, this 30-year-old will not be given many more years to make up his mind about what his place is on the team.

8) Seiya Kinami, IF

This former third-round draft pick was selected for his ability to be a middle infielder with decent punch. However, his best season (out of four) was his rookie year and it’s not even close. Not only has he been losing playing time of late, but he has lost his ability to hit the ball with authority. Extra-base hits have become a scarcity, and since he does not boast speed or defensive prowess (he is not particularly poor, but far from Golden Glove level), he really has little left to offer that other players don’t also boast. With the additions of Ryo Watanabe and Yuto Takahama via an off-season trade, Kinami is not only expendable but among the older middle-infielders that the team has on the roster – even though he is still just 28.

7) Dan Onodera, OF

Onodera became Hanshin’s second position player selected in the development draft to upgrade himself to a regular contract. Chosen in 2019, he only needed a year and a half to go from number 127 to number 97. (He will wear #60 in 2023.) However, in the 1.5 seasons since then, he has yet to make an impact or get more than a few starts. He has the heart of a lion, but does not really have anything that separates him from the pack: power, speed, and defense are all average. Perhaps his versatility (he also can play 1B) will help some, but since the team drafted 3 right-handed outfielders this past fall, he’ll have stiffer competition to crack the lineup moving forward.

6) Yutaro Itayama, OF/IF

Honestly, Itayama’s story is not much different from Onodera’s, though he was drafted four years earlier. He was not a development player but was somewhat of an afterthought as a sixth-round draft pick. He is fiercely competitive and has one of the better physiques on the team. He is also versatile, able to play corner outfield and most infield positions, too. However, he has had seven years in which to establish himself as a relevant piece of the puzzle, and yet he has only made 82 top-squad plate appearances in six seasons since his rookie year. He will turn 29 before Opening Day, and the team can only give so many chances to this career .219 hitter.

5) Yuya Katayama, C

Some guys (see #3 below) have extra staying power because of their presence on the bench. Katayama finally made his top-squad debut in 2022, but it was very limited and short-lived. He is the team’s lone lefty-hitting catcher at present, and makes a lot of noise for his teammates, but other than that, he has offered very little to the team in terms of production since being drafted as a development player back in 2018. I dare say this fall, if the team elects to draft a catcher or two, Katayama will be the first backstop on the chopping block.

4) Akira Niho, RHP

Once upon a time (was it the start of the 2021 season?), we traded Masahiro Nakatani, a struggling slugger, and acquired this pitcher from the SoftBank Hawks. Nakatani hit 20 home runs for us in 2017 but did little after that. We had a record (which continues to this day) of reviving the careers of discarded Hawks pitchers (Robert Suarez, Yuta Watanabe, Ren Kajiya, etc.)… but this is one who simply has not gotten it done in two seasons with the Tigers. Yes, he saved more games than anyone else in the Western League (farm) last year (13), but that means precious little when you’re 32 and you’re neither an effective starter nor a consistent or fearsome reliever. For the record, he had a 4.06 ERA on the farm last year. Ugh.

3) Fumiya Hojoh, IF

With Shintaro Fujinami moving to the majors, Hojoh is the last member of the 2012 draft still on the roster. He is still just 28 years old, but was picked in the second round because of his exploits in the Koshien tournaments in high school. He had a brief spell where it looked like he would be the heir apparent to Takashi Toritani at shortstop, but a slump at the start of 2017 and a collarbone injury at the end of 2018 has derailed him significantly. Now he finds himself low on the depth chart, and all that’s left to separate him from the rest is his boisterous presence on the bench.

2) Kosuke Baba, RHP

For the longest time, the Tigers picked nothing but duds in the first round of the draft. That trend ended in 2016 with Yusuke Ohyama but made a brief return in 2017 when Baba was chosen. Granted, he was Plan C that year, but nevertheless, he has yet to make a mark in any of his five seasons. Some thought he would be snatched up in the Active Players’ draft in December, but it seems even other teams lacked an interest in this 28-year-old. If he does not make his way to the top squad full-time in 2023, he may end up on the scrap pile at year’s end. Here’s to hoping he can prove his worth.

1) Shun Takayama, OF

Sad to say that Takayama could be seen as the last “bad” first-round pick the team made. No one was saying that in 2016, his rookie season, though. After all, he set the club record for most hits by a rookie (that record was broken in 2019 by Koji Chikamoto though), and seemed destined for a spot on the all-star team year in and year out. But something happened to this 29-year-old, and it is hard to identify exactly what it was. Sufficed to say that his hit total since 2016 (136) has gone: 82, 22, 73, 7, 0, 10. The writing appears to be on the wall. New manager Akinobu Okada seems to have taken a shining to him, though, which might buy him a bit more precious time.