Free Agent Poll: Munetaka Murakami

We’ve been doing this for several years now. We reviewed some of the top free agents, as rated by Keith Law in The Athletic and Ben Clemens at FanGraphs, using the contracts FanGraphs suggests they will receive, and asked if we should sign them.

Munetaka Murakami is number 12 on the FanGraphs free agent list and number 10 on Keith Law’s list.

He is a left-handed hitting corner infielder from Japan. Last year he hit .273/.379/.663, with 22 home runs, for the Swallows in 56 games. He 25, will be 26 in February. He’s a power hitting. In eight seasons with the Swallows, he has 246 home runs.

I haven’t seen him play much, I have no idea how he looks at third base.

Keith Law says:

MLB teams have been burning for Murakami to be posted for years, but the wild sheep chase is finally over as the Yakult Swallows are likely to post him this winter. He missed almost the entire first half of 2025 after offseason elbow surgery and then dealt with a nagging oblique injury, but in the 56 games he did play he still hit 22 homers with a .273/.379/.663 line, showing the big power and patience that made him such a coveted target. He starts with his hands way out from his body, which is pretty common for NPB players (Shohei Ohtani did this much more in Japan before he came to the Angels), and even in Japan he’s posted some high strikeout rates — 28.6 percent this past year, 29.5 percent the year before — with a greater tendency to chase stuff out of the zone. I’m also concerned about his ability to get to hard stuff in, given where his hands begin, although I had that concern with Ohtani and he obliterated those pitches in MLB after a year or so of adjustments. Murakami’s a third baseman now with good enough hands for the position but limited range, and he’ll probably end up at first base when he signs. He has 30+ homer upside with patience, probably a high three-true-outcomes line in the end, but wide variance in his potential value depending on how much contact he can maintain against better pitching in MLB.

Ben Clemens:

Murakami is the latest NPB superstar to head across the Pacific, and bidding frenzies have accompanied his compatriots each time. He’s not subject to the international amateur bonus limits that capped the paydays for Shohei Ohtani and Roki Sasaki, which means the sky is the limit. As a decorated home run hitter who hasn’t yet turned 26, he’s the kind of star teams dream about locking down. As a result, Murakami’s deal is going to extend far into the future. I’ve pegged seven years here, but a longer deal with a player option or even a shorter one with some kind of complicated extension-esque kicker wouldn’t surprise me either.

Ben figures him to get seven years, at $22 million per for a total of $154 million.