Baseball: A Two-Way Player-Chapter 619 - 157: Posting Turmoil (Part 2)

After all, given Lin Guanglai's achievements in Japan over the past few years, Nomura Katsuhiko is confident that he can negotiate a groundbreaking contract for his player without pitching a single ball—the Major League teams get a top player, the player finds a good place, and SoftBank receives a valuable compensation. It's a "three-win" deal.

But the current problem is that although Lin Guanglai has played four seasons in Nippon Professional Baseball, he is only 21 years old this year and just turning 22 early next year, still categorized as an international under-25.

According to the latest Collective Bargaining Agreement in Major League Baseball, this means that if Lin Guanglai wants to develop in the United States, he must give up his substantial 350 million yen annual salary with SoftBank and sign a minor league contract with a base salary of only $545,000 (approximately 54.5 million yen at the time), and can only get higher wages through salary arbitration after three years.

Also restricted by this status, Major League teams cannot pursue Lin Guanglai with unlimited bidding like they did with Matsuzaka Daisuke or Yu Darvish; nor can they directly drop a $20 million transfer fee to start negotiations with Lin Guanglai.

Ever since the Boston Red Sox defied the "soft cap" on signing international players in early 2015, paying a penalty to sign Cuban player Yoan Moncada for $63 million, Major League Baseball has tightly regulated the amount teams can spend in the international amateur player market to maintain league balance.

Depending on the market size of each team, the new Collective Bargaining Agreement allocates $4.75 to $5.75 million in signing budgets to each team, stipulating that each team can only trade up to 75% of their share—big market teams are given $4.75 million, medium market teams $5.25 million, and small market teams $5.75 million.

Considering that Major League teams have already spent fixed international player quotas in Latin America, this means that for the under-25 Lin Guanglai, these teams can offer a maximum signing bonus of about $3.5 million.

And if this new rule is implemented before Lin Guanglai's posting, as his parent team, Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks would only receive about $700,000 (approximately 70 million yen) in signing compensation—which is less than Lin Guanglai's annual salary.

Lin Guanglai himself doesn't have any issues, as he can completely sacrifice a huge amount of money for his dream, and the loss in wages can be compensated through sponsorship contract renewals and new signings, which is not a problem;

The most important issue is still on SoftBank's side: If not out of respect for the player himself, SoftBank would not agree to let Lin Guanglai post this early, as their willingness is not strong;

Not even counting equipment wear and daily living expenses, just the salary SoftBank paid Lin Guanglai over the past four years is close to 800 million yen—and now, if someone tells the team's executives that the Americans only need to pay 70 million yen to take away the team's star player, it would be an unacceptable figure for anyone.

Sitting quietly for a while, contemplating a strategy, Nomura Katsuhiko jumped up from his seat, "No, we can't just sit and wait to die, there's no need to let Guanglai know about it for now; if it affects his preparation, it wouldn't be worth it..."

"I heard Ohtani is also considering posting, so if the new rules are implemented, it won't just affect SoftBank alone..." As his thoughts raced, Nomura Katsuhiko, the agent who orchestrated the greatest Nippon Professional Baseball-to-Major League transfer case in history, roughly formulated a countermeasure, "After all, the person who created the problem should solve it—it seems like I'll have to visit both Fukuoka and Sapporo..."

With this in mind, Nomura Katsuhiko took out his phone, first calling the president of Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks, Goto Youkou:

"Hello, President Goto, I heard some rumors regarding Guanglai's posting..."

"Yes, yes, you should have heard as well—I believe we shouldn't just sit and wait, instead, we should take proactive actions, because both Guanglai and I want to use the signing bonus to compensate for SoftBank's loss, we're the least in favor of the new rules being implemented immediately... Okay, okay, I'll arrive in Fukuoka this afternoon, we can discuss in detail then... No, no, no need to notify Guanglai, let him focus on preparing, leave things like this to me as his agent..."

After briefing Goto Youkou, Nomura Katsuhiko searched his contact list and dialed another number:

"President Mozawa, long time no talk, this is Nomura speaking... Have you heard any rumors recently about the posting system's changes...? Yes, yes, I guessed you wouldn't support this change either, given that a player once worth $20 million can now only be sold at a loss, no one would accept it... Here's my idea, tell me what you think... Okay, okay, let's discuss the details when we meet in person, how about tomorrow? Okay, okay, I'll arrive in Sapporo on time tomorrow afternoon!"

The person on the other end was the president of Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters, Mozawa Shuichi, and Nomura Katsuhiko chose to call him because he foresaw that the Fighter team would align with his side.

After all, compared with the wealthy SoftBank, teams like the Fighters, which are small to medium size, are more reliant on generating income through posting; and if new policies devalue Ohtani Shohai, they would be most unable to bear it.

Since Nippon Professional Baseball and Major League Baseball are determined to implement the new posting policy, he will unite the owners of these teams and the media to apply pressure;

His objective is never to stop the new posting system from being implemented, but merely to delay its implementation for one or two years—Nomura Katsuhiko believes that with his comprehensive maneuvering, such a result is not difficult to achieve, and the higher-ups in the sports will likely realize this.

All of this is for one purpose: in the upcoming 2017 season, he wants Lin Guanglai to make a second leap in his career, standing on the Major League stage to showcase his talent and abilities to baseball fans worldwide!

Nomura Katsuhiko truly is a highly capable agent: with his relentless efforts, he united multiple teams including Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks and Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters to apply pressure on the Nippon Professional Baseball League, using carrot-and-stick negotiation tactics hoping the league would delay the posting system reform.

Negotiations spanned almost half a month, and no one knows exactly what conflicts arose during the process, nor how both parties eventually reached a consensus.

At least for Lin Guanglai, when Nomura Katsuhiko appeared before him again, he had a satisfied smile on his face.

"The negotiations with the Nippon Professional Baseball League are nearly complete. Now just waiting for them to end discussions with the American player's union, then the announcement will be made—If all goes well, next season, Guanglai, you will be able to go to the Major League!"

Responding to his agent with a "Hmm," Lin Guanglai didn't express much excitement, or rather, his focus wasn't on the posting issue.

The climactic final round of the championship game has entered its last stages; SoftBank, holding a 1-game advantage, is instead pushed to a 3-3 disadvantage at their home stadium by the second-placed Fighters.

An exhilarating Game 7 is about to take place!!!