Hart, a client of NPG Sports, enjoyed a breakout showing in the Korea Baseball Organization in 2024 and has drawn big league interest throughout the winter. He’s the second starter the Friars have added in as many days, as San Diego also came to terms on a four-year, $55MM deal with Nick Pivetta last night.

Hart, who turned 32 in November, was torched for 19 runs in 11 innings with the 2020 Red Sox, his lone MLB experience to date. He has a fairly nondescript 4.36 ERA in 334 2/3 Triple-A frames as well, but a move overseas and some changes to his pitch repertoire unlocked new reason for optimism.

Brandishing a new sweeper, a heavier reliance on his changeup and using his four-seamer more at the top of the zone in South Korea, Hart broke out with a 2.69 earned run average over 26 starts for the KBO’s NC Dinos. He racked up 157 innings, fanned 28.8% of his opponents and issued walks at a 6% clip. That performance earned him the Choi Dong-won Award — the KBO equivalent of MLB’s Cy Young Award.

Hart now joins fellow newcomer Pivetta and holdovers Dylan Cease, Michael King and Yu Darvish in San Diego’s rotation mix. He could have to compete with Matt Waldron, Jhony Brito and Randy Vasquez for that fifth spot behind the four established veterans, but Hart at the very least seems like the front-runner to land that job.

It’s always possible that a trade changes the calculus, but the minimal 2025 commitments to Hart ($1.5MM), Pivetta ($4MM), Jason Heyward ($1MM) and Connor Joe ($1MM) over the past week have addressed several needs at bargain prices — at least for this year. (Pivetta will earn $19MM in 2026, $14MM in 2027 and $18MM in 2028.) Both Cease and King have popped up on the rumor mill this winter — Cease in particular — but as of this morning the Padres are reportedly planning to hold onto both. That can be revisited at the deadline if the season doesn’t play out as hoped. For the time being, the recent slate of cost-effective pickups seems to have filled various needs within the (very) tight confines of the payroll limitations president of baseball operations A.J. Preller has been navigating throughout the winter.

The additions of Hart, Pivetta, Heyward and Joe over the past week have pushed San Diego’s payroll to a projected $207MM, per RosterResource. That’s an increase of nearly $40MM over last season’s end-of-year mark. The Friars have a projected $259MM worth of CBT obligations as well, placing them a hefty $18MM over the $241MM luxury threshold. However, since they reset their penalty level when they ducked under the tax line in 2024, they’ll be faced with only the minimum penalty: a 20% tax on their current overages. That’s about $3.6MM in penalties right now, and it’s possible trades of players other than Cease/King could yet reduce the bill. The Padres have been open to offers on reliever Robert Suarez, and they’d surely be open to offers on left-hander Wandy Peralta or infielder Jake Cronenworth, too, if it meant shedding a notable chunk of either player’s contract.

MLBTR’s Tim Dierkes reports today that Hart has some level of interest from six big league clubs, one of whom has been trying to free up some payroll space before adding Hart or another free agent. At the very least, that’s indicative of a team (or teams) being willing to put forth a big league offer to sign the lefty. Though there hasn’t been much reporting on Hart’s ongoing free agency this winter, he was linked to the Orioles, Astros, Twins, Brewers and Yankees in late December. More than half the league is reported to have at least checked in, though that obviously doesn’t indicate serious interest from all those parties.

Hart’s breakout overseas is reminiscent of recent KBO success stories like Erick Fedde, Chris Flexen and Merrill Kelly, among others. That said, he’ll pitch all of next season at 32. That’s a notable difference from recent KBO-to-MLB arms. Fedde returned ahead of his age-31 season and had the benefit of being a former first-round pick and top prospect. Kelly was 30 when he signed a modest two-year deal with Arizona on the back of a terrific four-year run in South Korea. Flexen’s lone season in the KBO was his age-25 campaign. He returned on a two-year deal with the Mariners at just 26 years old. Of the bunch, Fedde’s $15MM guarantee over two years is the largest contract.

Hart is older than the rest of that group and lacks the prospect pedigree Fedde had. Like many of those pitchers, however, he’s benefited from demonstrable changes to his pitching repertoire since heading to the KBO. He added a new sweeper this season, began throwing his four-seamer up in the zone/above the zone to get some chases, and has used his changeup more heavily. His heater isn’t the type of power offering that modern teams covet, sitting low-90s and peaking around 94 mph, but it’s generally easier for a lefty to get by with lesser velocity than a righty.

Whether that’s enough to sell a major league front office on his viability as a big league rotation cog remains to be seen. Fedde, the most successful of the group in the KBO, won the Choi Dong-won and was named KBO MVP after posting a flat 2.00 ERA with better strikeout and walk rates (29.5% and 4.9%, respectively) than Hart turned in this past season.

If not a return to Major League Baseball, Hart will still have ample opportunity to earn money in Asia. He’s drawn interest from both KBO clubs and teams in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball, per Dierkes.

Kim’s former team, the Kiwoom Heroes, officially posted him on December 5, giving him until 4:00 PM CT this afternoon to sign with an MLB club. As the days ticked by and the rumor mill remained relatively quiet, it seemed like a legitimate possibility that Kim would return for one more season with the Heroes. Instead, the Dodgers, who hadn’t been closely linked to Kim this winter, swooped in and made a winning offer in the nick of time. In addition to Kim’s salary, the Dodgers will have to pay a $2.5MM release fee to the Heroes (20% of the guaranteed $12.5MM on his deal). Their total investment is $15MM.

Kim, soon to be 26, is a four-time consecutive winner of the KBO Golden Glove Award, given annually to the best overall player at each position. He won the award at shortstop in 2021 before moving to second base and winning each year from 2022-24. In addition to playing a strong second base and at least a capable shortstop, Kim is also an asset on the basepaths. He led the KBO in stolen bases in 2021 and has swiped at least 20 bags in all seven full seasons of his career. His glove and legs should give him a relatively high floor as a utility player in MLB, if nothing more.

The big question is how Kim’s bat will hold up against MLB pitching. While he struggled at the plate early in his career, the lefty batter blossomed into a well-above-average hitter during his last three years in the KBO. From 2022-24, he produced a .326 batting average and a .384 OBP, while his wRC+ was never below 118 in any season. However, Kim has never hit for much power, even by the slightly lower power standards of the KBO. His 2024 season was the best of his career power-wise – he reached double-digit home runs for the first time – but his .132 isolated power was still below league average.  Thus, it’s fair to worry that Kim might not have the necessary power to be an everyday player in MLB. Just look at his former KBO teammate Ha-Seong Kim. Ha-Seong Kim was a genuine power threat in the KBO, socking 30 homers in 138 games during his final season in Korea. Since coming to MLB, he has become known as a soft-hitting contact specialist. His career .137 ISO in MLB is 15% worse than the league average over the last four years.

When MLBTR ranked Hyseong Kim at no. 26 on our Top 50 Free Agents list, we predicted he’d sign a three-year, $24MM contract. His actual deal guarantees him a little more than half of that predicted salary. That said, it’s worth mentioning that Kim reportedly turned down more money from at least one other team. A representative from Kim’s agency, CAA Baseball, told a Korean media outlet (passed along by Jeeho Yoo of Yonhap News) that the Angels offered him a five-year, $28MM deal, while the Mariners, Cubs, and Padres also made offers with undisclosed terms. Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register contradicts that report. According to Fletcher, the Angels made an offer to Kim but did not top what he received from the Dodgers.

To that point, Kim might not have a guaranteed starting role in L.A. The Dodgers already have Gavin Lux to play second base, Mookie Betts at shortstop, and Max Muncy holding down the hot corner. Furthermore, they have the talented defensive shortstop Miguel Rojas and the versatile Chris Taylor on the bench. Center fielder Tommy Edman can also play all around the infield.

According to Fabian Ardaya of The Athletic, Kim will play a “super-utility role” in 2025. The use of the prefix “super” seems to imply that he’ll be playing several positions. While he has significant experience at both shortstop and second base, he has only played a handful of games at third base in his professional career. He also played 44 games in left field during the 2020 season, and it will be interesting to see if the Dodgers consider using him in the outfield at all. As a “super-utility” player, Kim will presumably have a bigger role than that of a typical bench bat, but with so much competition on the Dodgers’ talent-filled roster, he’ll have to earn his playing time.

The fact that the Dodgers signed Kim despite already having so many infielders is evidence of how much this team values depth and flexibility. It’s also a sign of how much they value what Kim can bring to the table. Funnily enough, manager Dave Roberts has already made his team’s affinity for Kim quite clear. After the Dodgers played an exhibition match against the Korean national team last March, Roberts told reporters (including Yoo), “Our scouts like the second baseman: just the way his body moves.” That second baseman, of course, was Kim.

Various reports out of South Korea were first with the news that Kim was signing with Los Angeles on a three-year deal with a two-year club option. Jon Heyman of the New York Post was first to report the $12.5MM guarantee and the $22MM maximum value.

That opens an opportunity for the 28-year-old Logue. The southpaw is coming off an excellent Triple-A showing. Logue pitched 97 1/3 innings of 2.59 ERA ball in the upper minors between the Braves and Dodgers systems. That earned him a late-season cameo with Los Angeles. Logue pitched twice for the Dodgers and gave up four runs over two innings.

Logue has appeared in the majors in three consecutive seasons. The majority of that experience came with the A’s in 2022. He started 10 of 14 appearances that year, struggling to a 6.79 earned run average over 57 innings. Logue made three long relief appearances for the Tigers the following season, allowing nine runs over 11 innings.

The Dodgers declined to tender him a contract last month. He could certainly have found a minor league deal if he wanted to stay in affiliated ball, but he’ll land a much better guarantee with the Bears. This will be Logue’s first overseas work after eight years in the minors. He joins fellow southpaw Cole Irvin and outfielder Jake Cave as the team’s three foreign-born players.

It’ll be the first stint overseas for the 27-year-old Allen — a former top prospect who’s now bounced to seven different MLB organizations in his career, appearing in the majors with four of them. Allen spent the 2024 season with the Diamondbacks, pitching 28 innings of 5.46 ERA ball in the majors and adding another 96 1/3 frames at the Triple-A level.

Allen breezed through the lower minors and had a terrific season between Double-A and Triple-A as a 21-year-old back in 2018, but his results both in the majors and in Triple-A have generally been subpar since that time. He altered his repertoire this past season, however, debuting a new splitter that seems to have caught the Dinos’ attention. The pitch generated strong results and drew positive grades from both Statcast and Sports Info Solutions. The Dinos mentioned it in their press release, wherein GM Seon-nam Lim noted that Allen is expected to join their rotation.

Allen heads over the the KBO for his age-28 season, giving him plenty of time to potentially parlay a strong showing in Asia into a big league return. He’d hardly be the first player to do so. Because Allen debuted in the majors less than a month after his 22nd birthday, he’s perhaps younger than many fans might expect of a journeyman who’s been with seven MLB organizations over a nearly decade-long pro career. If he can make further gains with that new split-changeup, it’s feasible that he could garner a look from big league clubs in future offseasons.

Wisdom, 33, was a first-round pick by St. Louis back in 2012 but but didn’t make his big league debut until 2018. After making it into just 43 games across three seasons in the majors with the Cardinals, Rangers, and Cubs, he settled into a regular role with Chicago during the 2021 season. As a 29-year-old rookie that year, Wisdom took over the everyday third base job from outgoing star Kris Bryant and performed admirably in the role. He hit .231/.305/.518 (117 wRC+) despite an eye-popping 40.8% strikeout rate thanks to 28 homers in just 375 trips to the plate and earned himself a fourth-place finish in NL Rookie of the Year voting.

That success Wisdom found in his rookie season suggested he might have a future in the majors if he managed to cut down on the strikeouts a bit, and he did that over the next two seasons. In 2022 and ’23, Wisdom hit a combined .206/.295/.453 (108 wRC+) with a 35.2% strikeout rate and 48 homers in 836 trips to the plate. By the end of the 2023 season, Wisdom had generally ceded his everyday role in the lineup to a combination of Nick Madrigal, Christopher Morel, and deadline addition Jeimer Candelario, and he headed into the 2024 season projecting as a bench bat for Chicago.

His time on the bench with the Cubs did not go especially well, as Wisdom posted his worst season since getting an extended look in the majors back in 2021. He stepped up to the plate 174 times in 75 games with Chicago this year and hit just .171/.237/.392 (75 wRC+). While his strikeout rate ticked down to “just” 33.9%, Wisdom struggled to generate his trademark power with just eight home runs this year, and his walk rate suffered as he took a free base just 5.7% of the time. That steep decline in production in conjunction with Wisdom’s ever-shrinking role on the team led the Cubs to non-tender him last month, at which point he joined the free agent market.

Now, it appears he’ll head overseas to test his abilities in KBO league play, which is notoriously devoid of high-end power hitters. Former big league Matt Davidson led the league with 46 home runs last year and sported a high-power, strikeout-heavy profile similar to Wisdom during his time in the majors, so it’s certainly within the realm of possibility that Wisdom winds up doing quite well for himself as part of a Tigers offense that already led the KBO league in slugging percentage this past season.

Ponce began his professional career in the Brewers organization, agreeing to a $1.108MM signing bonus as the 55th overall pick in the 2015 draft. While he was never a highly-regarded prospect, Baseball America ranked him at no. 9 in Milwaukee’s system entering the 2016 season and included him among the team’s top 30 in each of the next three years. His minor league numbers were typically solid if never especially inspiring; over 394 innings in the Brewers org from Rookie Ball to Double-A, he pitched to a 3.72 ERA and 3.62 FIP. He looked sharper after moving into a more regular relief role at Double-A Biloxi partway through the 2018 season, putting up a 3.29 ERA and 3.11 FIP in 82 IP.

The Brewers dealt Ponce to the Pirates in exchange for Jordan Lyles at the 2019 trade deadline. It was with Pittsburgh that the right-hander made his few big league appearances, pitching in 20 games from 2020-21. Over 55 1/3 innings, he allowed 34 runs (30 earned), good for a 5.86 ERA. He gave up 13 home runs and struck out just 19.6% of the batters he faced. While his 4.38 SIERA was a little more promising than the rest of his numbers, he failed to impress the Pirates brass. At the end of the 2021 season, the team granted him his release to pursue an opportunity in Japan.

Ponce spent the 2022 and ’23 seasons with the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters. He looked solid with the Fighters, pitching to a 3.35 ERA over 83 1/3 innings in 2022 and a 3.66 ERA over 51 2/3 innings in 2023. However, things took a turn for the worse after he signed with the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles for the 2024 campaign. Across 67 innings, he put up an ugly 6.72 ERA. His 3.50 strikeout-to-walk ratio was actually significantly better than it was in his first two NPB seasons, and his home run rate was only slightly higher than the league average. Nevertheless, he struggled badly to keep hitters off the bases and runs off the board. On the bright side, his numbers were much better with the club’s farm team in the Eastern League, with whom he pitched to a 2.25 ERA in another 60 innings of work.

As he heads from one Eagles club to another, Ponce will hope for better results on balls in play in his age-31 season. If he can perform more like he did in his first two NPB seasons, he has the skills to be a productive arm for the Hanwha Eagles in 2025.

Davidson heads to a foreign league for the first time in his career. The 6’2″ southpaw made one appearance in the major leagues this year. He tossed 4 2/3 innings out of the bullpen for the Orioles, picking up the win in a blowout victory over the Twins in the season’s final weekend. Davidson spent the rest of the year with Baltimore’s Triple-A club in Norfolk. He started 17 of 32 outings and worked to a 3.89 earned run average across 115 2/3 frames.

Baltimore waived Davidson shortly after the season concluded. He elected minor league free agency. Rather than accept another minor league deal, he’ll parlay his solid Triple-A numbers into the KBO opportunity. The 28-year-old has a 5.76 ERA over 129 2/3 major league innings across four teams.

Barnes, who pitched for the Minnesota Twins in 2021, has been a reliable piece of the Lotte rotation for the last three years. He owns a 3.42 ERA in a little more than 500 KBO innings. Barnes turned in a 3.35 mark with 171 strikeouts over 150 2/3 innings this past season.

Florial signed with the Yankees as an international free agent in 2015. He quickly began turning heads in the organization with his strong performance in the low minors. Entering the 2019 season, MLB Pipeline, Baseball America, and FanGraphs all ranked him as the number one prospect in the system. He was as toolsy as they come, with plus speed, big raw power, and a powerful throwing arm in center field.

Unfortunately, Florial never found a way to tap into all his potential at the highest level. Over parts of four seasons with the Yankees from 2020-23, he appeared in just 48 games, slashing .209/.313/.296 with a 75 wRC+. The Yankees traded him to the Guardians after the 2023 season, and he earned more playing time in Cleveland, appearing in 36 games for the Guardians in April and May. However, his results were just as poor. Over 111 trips to the plate, he put up a .173/.264/.367 batting line, good for an 80 wRC+. Cleveland designated him for assignment at the end of May, and he spent the rest of the season with the Triple-A Columbus Clippers.

Although Florial didn’t look any better with the Clippers than he did with the Guardians (.213 AVG, 83 wRC+), he has had success at Triple-A in the recent past. From 2022-23, he put up an impressive .283/.374/.523 slash-line over 202 games for the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders. In that time, he hit 43 home runs, stole 64 bases, and produced a 127 wRC+. It’s that level of performance the Eagles are surely hoping he’ll replicate in his first season in the KBO.

9:17pm: The KBO announced that the Heroes have officially made Kim available via the posting system. The posting went into effect at noon on Wednesday in South Korean time, not at 12:00 pm Eastern as previously reported. According to Jeeho Yoo of Yonhap News (X link), the 30-day signing period will officially begin at 8:00 a.m. Eastern the morning after MLB informs teams of Kim’s posting.

2:30pm: Infielder Hyeseong Kim is expected to be officially posted by the Kiwoom Heroes of the Korea Baseball Organization on Wednesday at noon Eastern/11am Central, per Jon Morosi of MLB Network (X link). Once it’s official, that will start a 30-day window where all MLB clubs can negotiate with Kim and his representatives. If no deal is signed in that time, he will return to the Heroes for the 2025 season. (The NPB posting window has been expanded from 30 days to 45 days but KBO players still have a 30-day time frame.)

Kim, 26 in January, said himself last week that he believed the formal posting process was about a week away. It appears that timeline is holding, so Kim will be officially be available to MLB clubs as of tomorrow. Kim will be considered a “professional” under MLB rules because he is at least 25 years old and has at least six years of experience in a foreign league. As such, he can sign a deal of any length or dollar amount, depending on what MLB clubs are willing to offer. That’s in contrast to someone like Roki Sasaki, who is only 23 years old and will therefore be capped by the international bonus system.

It isn’t likely that Kim will secure a massive deal, but he could still have some interest. He is expected to provide a somewhat similar skillset to his former double play partner Ha-Seong Kim, no relation, as both players are considered sure-handed defenders at multiple spots on the diamond. Hyeseong has mostly played the two middle infield spots, but also with brief stints at third base and in the outfield corners.

Offensively, Hyeseong is a tick below Ha-Seong, however. Hyeseong has slashed .304/.364/.403 in his eight KBO seasons whereas Ha-Seong hit .294/.373/.493 in his seven campaigns in Korea. The batting average and on-base numbers are fairly close but Ha-Seong clearly has the edge in terms of slugging. Hyeseong got to 11 home runs in 2024, a career high for him, whereas Ha-Seong had 19 or more homers in his final six KBO seasons, including 30 in the final year.

Still, even if Hyeseong is a tick below Ha-Seong in the power department, his youth and athleticism should work in his favor. As mentioned, he is considered a strong defender and could be placed at multiple different positions. He has stolen between 20 and 46 bases in each of the past six seasons.

MLBTR predicted he could secure a three-year deal with a $24MM guarantee as part of the annual Top 50 Free Agents post. However, predicting the interest in a player making the move from overseas can be difficult, as players like Jung Hoo Lee and Masataka Yoshida both proved to have much more earning power than was assumed by forecasters.

The Mariners are reportedly interested in Kim but it stands to reason that plenty of others would be in the mix as well, given his versatility. Clubs like the Giants, White Sox, Marlins, Brewers and others are speculative fits. Players like Willy Adames, Ha-Seong Kim, Gleyber Torres and others are also available in the middle infield free agent market. They will be joined by Hyeseong but the 30-day posting window means there will be clarity on his status by the first few days of 2025, at the latest.

In addition to the money going to Kim, a signing club will also have to pay a posting fee to the Heroes, the value of which will depend upon the size of the contract. The fee will be calculated as 20% of the contract’s first $25MM, plus 17.5% of the next $25MM and 15% of any dollars thereafter. Additional earnings, such as performance bonuses/incentives or salaries on option years fall under that purview once they are unlocked or exercised.

De Jesus is actually quite familiar with the KBO League after signing with the Kiwoom Heroes last December. The southpaw enjoyed a solid season for the Heroes last year as he pitched to a 3.68 ERA in 171 1/3 innings of work across 30 starts. He struck out 24.5% of opponents while walking just 6%, though his 22 home runs allowed held down his overall production. Even so, De Jesus clearly showed enough in his first season overseas to earn himself another contract ahead of his age-28 campaign.

A native of Venezuela, De Jesus signed with the Red Sox as an international amateur and made his pro debut back in 2014. The lefty pitched primarily out of the rotation during his time in the minors with Boston but in 2021 saw his role shifted to a more flexible one where he split time between the rotation and bullpen as he reached the upper levels of the minors. He made one start for the club at Triple-A before electing minor league free agency that autumn and latching on with the Giants on a minor league deal. He didn’t reach the big leagues during his year in San Francisco, as he struggled somewhat with the club’s Sacramento affiliate in 35 appearances (19 starts).

That led him to sign a fresh minor league deal with the Marlins during the 2022-23 offseason. His time at the club’s Triple-A affiliate in Jacksonville was somewhat lackluster, as he pitched to a 4.78 ERA in 84 2/3 frames. That didn’t stop the Marlins from giving De Jesus his first crack at big league action, however. The lefty made two appearances with Miami in September, though both left much to be desired. Overall, he surrendered eight runs on nine hits, four walks, and three hit batters while striking out five across 6 1/3 innings of work. That disastrous start to De Jesus’s big league career led the Marlins to designate him for assignment not long after, and he once again elected to test the open market.

That, of course, led him to the KBO League, where he’s now revitalized his career. As De Jesus is just entering his age-28 season, it remains well within the realm of possibility that the lefty could attempt to make a stateside comeback at some point down the line, as KBO alum like Merrill Kelly and Erick Fedde have done successfully in recent years. In the meantime, however, he’ll look to replicate the success he had with the Heroes last year with KT in 2025.

Brito, now 32, was once a well-regarded prospect in the Diamondbacks system. He was chosen as the organization’s minor league Minor League Player of the Year in 2015, and most sources considered him one of the team’s top 10 prospects entering the 2016 season. However, he was never able to translate his minor league success to the majors. Over 99 MLB games with the D-backs and Blue Jays from 2015-19, Brito slashed .176/.216/.309 in 218 trips to the plate. Despite his elite sprint speed and solid outfield defense, he produced -0.6 FanGraphs WAR.

After a rough year at Triple-A with the Yankees in 2021, Brito signed a contract with the Kia Tigers and packed his bags for Korea. It turned out to be the right decision. He was named a KBO All-Star in each of his first two seasons with the Tigers. While he did not make the All-Star team in 2024, he set new career highs in home runs, runs scored, and RBI. He also helped his club win the Korean Series for the 12th time in franchise history and the first time since 2017. All told, Brito has slashed .302/.352/.491 with 63 home runs, 40 stolen bases, and an .843 OPS over three seasons in the KBO.

Heyman’s report does not necessarily suggest that Brito is planning (or even trying) to return to affiliated ball. He has enjoyed a successful career so far in Korea, in terms of individual accolades, team accomplishments, and financial compensation. His contract for the 2024 season guaranteed him $800K and contained an additional $400K in incentives. If he can land a similar deal from the Kia Tigers for 2025, one can see why he wouldn’t be interested in returning to North America for anything less than a guaranteed contract. Despite his excellent performance in the KBO, his uninspiring MLB track record could scare off potential suitors from offering such a guarantee.

Cuevas, now 34, originally signed with the Red Sox as an 18-year-old international free agent in 2009. He would eventually bounce from the Red Sox, to the Tigers, to the Marlins, and back to the Red Sox, appearing in big league games for Boston and Detroit. He pitched to an 8.06 ERA and 4.92 SIERA in 22 1/3 MLB innings.

After the 2018 season, the Red Sox released Cuevas so he could pursue an opportunity in the KBO. From 2019-22, he pitched for the Wiz on a series of one-year contracts. However, he was released early in the 2022 season after suffering an elbow injury. Fortunately for Cuevas, the issue proved not to be too serious. He was able to make an appearance for the Diablos Rojos del México of the Mexican League later that year.

Cuevas returned to affiliated ball the following season, signing a minor league contract with the Dodgers in April 2023. He pitched 44 innings for Triple-A Oklahoma City, striking out 43, walking 20, and giving up 13 home runs, resulting in a 6.14 ERA and 7.47 FIP. On June 8, the Dodgers released Cuevas, allowing him to re-sign with the Wiz the next day. While his performance at Triple-A wasn’t exactly impressive, he clearly did enough to prove to his former club that his elbow was back to full strength. Indeed, he put up a 2.60 ERA and 2.79 FIP in 114 1/3 IP over the remainder of the KBO season.

Fresh off his successful 2023 campaign, Cuevas earned another contract from the Wiz. He didn’t look nearly as sharp in 2024 as he did the year before, producing a 4.10 ERA and 4.39 FIP. Still, he was durable and reliable, giving the team 31 starts and 173 1/3 IP. Only two KBO pitchers threw more innings this past season, and only one made more starts. Thus, it comes as little surprise that the Wiz have welcomed Cuevas back once again for 2025.

Davidson, 34, first signed with the Dinos back in January. Once a first-round pick in the 2009 draft by the Diamondbacks and a regular on top-100 prospect lists in the early 2010s, Davidson has appeared in parts of six big league seasons but has never quite been successful in establishing himself in the majors. He played just 31 games total at the big league level for Arizona. While he hit a decent .237/.333/.434 in that time, he was shipped to Chicago in the deal that brought Addison Reed to the Diamondbacks the following offseason.

After arriving in Chicago, Davidson was relegated to the minor leagues in the first few years of his time with the organization, where he hit quite well; the slugger is a career .253/.335/.479 hitter at the Triple-A level and demonstrated 20-homer power for the club’s Triple-A affiliate in Charlotte. He received semi-regular playing time with the White Sox from 2017 to 2018 and hit a respectable .224/.291/.435 with 46 home runs during that time, though he also struck out at an untenable 35.1% clip. Since the end of the 2018 season, Davidson has appeared in just 33 games at the big league level. Most recently, he hit .167/.167/.292 in an eight-game stint with the Athletics in 2022.

2023 saw Davidson head overseas to try his hand at playing baseball in Asia, though he initially did not head to the KBO. First, he went to Japan to play for Nippon Professional Baseball’s Hiroshima Carp. He hit a middling .224/.288/.452 overall in 117 games for the Carp. While he slugged 21 homers, his high strikeout rates and lackluster on-base percentage led the club to part ways with him. That led him to the Dinos, and his first season in Korea could’ve hardly gone better. While serving as his club’s primary first baseman, Davidson slashed an excellent .306/.370/.633 in 131 games. He slugged a KBO-leading 46 homers, and his 1.003 OPS ranked third in the league.

That dominant performance clearly got the Dinos’ attention, and they were quick to lock him up for the next two seasons after his power helped to keep the team somewhat competitive during a disappointing 61-81 season. While Davidson’s deal guaranteed him just $700K last winter, this year he’s been guaranteed more than double that figure and could earn more than $3MM total over the life of the contract if the option for next year is picked up. Given Davidson’s age, it’s unclear whether attempting a comeback in the majors could be in the cards for him when his contract with the Dinos ends, though if he continues hitting as he did last year he could follow in the footsteps of Eric Thames and look to revive his stateside career after years of posting otherworldly numbers in KBO play.

Hernández, 30 in May, was a midseason replacement for the Twins. Once a potential rotation building block with the Marlins, he missed significant time due to injuries, including the entire 2023 season. He returned in 2024 to get limited looks with the Dodgers and Brewers before heading overseas to join the Twins in late July.

He went on to log 47 innings for them over 11 appearances, including nine starts. He allowed 4.02 earned runs per nine with a 28.2% strikeout rate, 8.2% walk rate and 51.2% ground ball rate. Yoo adds that Hernandez also tossed 11 scoreless innings in the postseason. The club clearly liked what they saw and will bring Hernández back for another season.

For Dean, 31, this will be his third season as a Twin. He played in parts of five MLB seasons from 2018 to 2022 but never got more than a part-time role. He has found a regular gig in Korea and has made the most of it. He hit 23 home runs last year and slashed .313/.376/.515, then followed that up with 32 home runs and a .319/.384/.573 line in 2024.

The MLB minimum salary is going to be $760K next year, so both players have gotten themselves up into a higher level of earning power, and likely with some extra job security as well. For the Twins, they also signed right-hander Yonny Chirinos this week, so this fills their quota of foreign-born players. Each KBO team is allowed three such players, with a maximum of two pitchers.