The Mariners made a slew of moves last offseason as part of their “reimagining” plan, but no addition came with more hype than free-agent signing Yusei Kikuchi. The club handed the Japanese star a four-year, $56MM contract – a deal that could turn into a seven-year, $109MM pact – with the expectation it was landing at least a mid-rotation starter. The left-handed Kikuchi could still evolve into that for the Mariners, but their investment hasn’t paid off as planned so far.
In his most recent start last Friday, the Astros lit up the 28-year-old Kikuchi for six earned runs on nine hits, including four home runs, in four innings. The performance dropped Kikuchi’s already uninspiring ERA to 5.49 through his first 118 innings in the majors, with FIP (5.95), xFIP (5.18) and SIERA (5.17) indicating he has deserved his poor run prevention numbers thus far. Home runs have been the main problem for Kikuchi, who has yielded them on 20.1 percent of fly balls and surrendered 2.14 HRs per nine innings. He ranks in the bottom five of the majors in both departments, including dead last in the latter category.
Unlike other recent ballyhooed Japanese imports (Yu Darvish, Masahiro Tanaka and Shohei Ohtani, to name a few), Kikuchi hasn’t excelled at missing bats in his initial MLB action. While Darvish, Tanaka and Ohtani each struck out more than a batter per inning upon reaching the bigs, Kikuchi has only set down 6.41 per nine via K, which outdoes just five qualified starters. Therefore, even though Kikuchi has logged a decent BB/9 (2.9), he sits 13th last in K/BB ratio (2.21). Unsurprisingly, his swinging-strike, chase and contact rates are also subpar.
To this point, Kikuchi has relied on a four-seam fastball (51.3 percent), slider (26.0) and curveball (17.4), per Statcast. The trouble is that two of those offerings – Kikuchi’s fastball and curve – have been eminently hittable. Batters have teed off on Kikuchi’s four-seamer for a .422 weighted on-base average/.386 expected wOBA, while they’ve lit up his curve for a .397/.431 pairing. Although they’ve mustered a .334 wOBA off Kikuchi’s slider, his .271 xwOBA against is far more encouraging. Looking at the location heatmaps for those pitches (via FanGraphs: four-seamer, slider, curve), it’s not hard to believe two have gotten crushed.
Lefties and righties alike have smacked around Kikuchi, who has yielded a .385 wOBA against the former and a .359 versus the latter. While his overall xwOBA against (.339) paints a much more optimistic picture than the actual mark (.369) hitters have put up, that’s not saying much. After all, according to Statcast, Kikuchi still only ranks in the majors’ 24th percentile in the category. Meanwhile, he’s in the league’s 48th percentile or worse in expected batting average against, expected slugging percentage against, hard-hit percentage against, exit velocity against, average fastball velocity (93.0 mph), fastball spin and strikeout percentage.
There clearly hasn’t been much to like about the rookie version of Kikuchi, which isn’t what the Mariners had in mind when they made him their headlining acquisition last offseason. Manager Scott Servais preached patience in regards to Kikuchi on Monday, saying this has been “a developmental year” and he’ll “learn from it.” That may prove to be the case. So far, however, Seattle can’t be thrilled with what Kikuchi has provided.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
MetsFanaticDanny
The only good Asian pitchers to pitch well in MLB was Hideo Nomo, Kazuhiro Sasaki & Shohei Otani.
lowtalker1
Yu
Mo Vaughn
So Darvish and Tanaka don’t make your list?
Lennon's Dad
Or Sasaki, who was an excellent closer. Shiggy was a great reliever for many years as well.
Lot of missed names.
.
MetsFanaticDanny
@Lennon’s Dad I did mention Sasaki.
Lennon's Dad
My bad. I will learn to read more carefully from my phone some day, but that day wasn’t today.
BuddyBoy
This!
jdgoat
This might be the worst opinion ever written on here and that’s saying a lot.
papasmurf25
Hiroki Kuroda, uehara, Tanaka, Darvish to name just a few more …. man you really nailed it bud, huh ?
frankf
Daisuke has a few spectacular seasons before he got hurt. Same with Koji Uehara.
ThisGuy 2
Spectacular? That’s hyperbole
InvalidUserID 2
Hiroki Kuroda would like a word with you.
Strike Four
why did you post this
UaintsGotsToLieCraig
Ryu?
Ashtem
He is Korean
bigdaddyt
So South Korea isn’t part of Southeast Asia anymore?
frankf
They moved.
GarryHarris
ROK is not in SE Asia.
Meko
I love that you made room for a guy with 10 total career pitching appearances yet skipped at least a dozen serviceable names
wgibson648
Shigetoshi Hasegawa
Yankeepatriot
Ohtani has only pitched 50 or so innings
rocky7
A little early to make any judgment on Otani don’t you think or are you of the opinion that 10 starts should vault him to the HOF already?
He didn’t even get around the league a second time to see if batters to adjust to him or allow him to continue his success. And, 1 year does not make a career. .
ceejaybecker
Iwakuma was good for several years. He even threw a no-hitter.
Braydon Gervais
Ryu says hello.
NorahW
Hisashi Iwakuma
lowtalker1
He should have went to San Diego.
rhymeoftheancientmariner
Yusei, I only hear what I want to.
blackandteal
I see what you did there.
Monkey’s Uncle
Yusei goodbye, and I say hello, hello, hello! I don’t know why Yusei goodbye when say hello.
Champagne
He’s been really bad, no question, but probably also worth noting that in addition to adapting to a new league and new country, his father died in early April (and the family requested he not stop pitching), and his wife gave birth to their first child in early July. If anyone gets a mulligan on their first season, it’s him.
ColossusOfClout
He was excellent at Yankee stadium in May, gave up 1 run in 7.2 innings.
bradthebluefish
Wow! That’s a lot to handle. Thanks for that.
jakethesnizake
Like no one saw that coming.
Strike Four
Take away all his starts against the Angels and his ERA is 4.21.
Begamin
take away all his starts against everybody and his ERA is 0.00
Monkey’s Uncle
Wow, he’s practically unhittable when he doesn’t face anyone!
rez2405 2
Well that’s actually true. A batter can’t make an out if he’s not facing a pitcher
HubcapDiamondStarHalo
Shew! Ten million bucks spent so the guy can “learn from it.” The Mariners are certainly hoping that the high price of education pays off.
Begamin
10 mil for a SP is generally what the lower end of free market SP go for. I mean, Michael Pineda is making 8 mil this season
HubcapDiamondStarHalo
That’s a good point… Still a pretty hellified tuition fee…
Lennon's Dad
He had/has front line potential. Those types don’t grow on trees.
TooToughToScuffle
I was among those who noticed his Japan league stats weren’t exactly ace-like, and predicted him around 4.5 ERA. Still, this is worse than could have been predicted.
terry g
He’ll grow into the job. He wasn’t signed as an ace but a middle rotation starter. He hasn’t lived up to that yet. For good or bad the Mariners have him for another 3 years to see how he develops. It’s not like the Mariners are competing this year or next.
Lennon's Dad
Lot of personal trauma that probably hasn’t helped as well. The guy has had a lot to deal with this year. Easy to see him rebounding next season with far less stress and armed with plenty of data.
Sid Bream
Hideki Okajima, Takashi Saito, Ken Takahashi, Junichi Tazawa(whilst with the Red Sox 2012-2016) Hisanori Takahashi (2010-2011) Hisashi Iwakuma, Shigetoshi Hasegawa a decent reliever. Kuroda would have had many more wins except for many 1 run ball games when he had a lack of run support, especially when he was with the Dodgers.
barrt10
Hopefully he doesnt turn into Kei Igawa 2.0
wgibson648
Or, Hideki Irabu [as George Steinbrenner referred to him, the “fat toad”]
wgibson648
Shigetoshi Hasegawa 1997 – 2005, was tremendous (at least with LA).
yamsi1912
Thanks Jerry!
KnicksFanCavsFan
Chien-Ming Wang Two time 19 game winner. Just don’t ask him to run the bases.
Yankeedynasty
Stupid National league