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| Report: Red Sox to Meet with Japanese High School Phenom | 10.15.09 at 1:19 am ET |
According to Nikkan Sports (as translated and linked by npbtracker.com), the Red Sox are scheduled to meet with Japanese left-hander Yusei Kikuchi, an 18-year-old who has starred in Japan’s Koshien Tournament, on Oct. 19. The Sox, according to the translated report, are one of eight major league teams slated to meet with Kikuchi.
Kikuchi is deciding whether to pitch in the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) league, or to bypass the Japanese draft to sign with a Major League Baseball team as an amateur free agent. His case is viewed as similar to that of Junichi Tazawa, the right-hander who signed with the Red Sox last December after pitching in Japan’s amateur Industrial League, though Kikuchi’s potential jump from high school directly to the United States is considered in some ways even more dramatic than was Tazawa’s.
The other MLB teams that are scheduled to meet with Kikuchi, according to the report, are the Dodgers, Rangers, Giants, Mariners, Mets, Yankees and Indians. NPBtracker also offered a scouting profile of Kikuchi. To read it, click here.
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