Digital Scouting Report: Roki Sasaki
Roki Sasaki is the latest Japanese phenom pitcher making the leap to MLB. It sounds like the reaction in Japan is like LeBron’s Decision: Fans are livid that Roki’s leaving before he won anything of note with his original squad. But some MLB team is about to benefit from an arm that’s been world-famous for years, and at the minimum salary.
So how good is Roki Sasaki now? I find the attributes from Pro Yakyuu Spirits are a good, reasonably neutral, native perspective on the player’s current talent. I’ve used it before on this site to state my preference for Seiya Suzuki over Masataka Yoshida, and to cast doubt on Kodai Senga’s durability, before any of these players made the leap to MLB.
Here are Sasaki’s attributes in the latest Prospi game:
There’s a lot of information there, but to hit the highlights:
- Right up top is the biggest thing: Top velocity: 165 km/h. That’s 102.5 MPH. Sasaki’s average velocity was famously down in 2024, possibly due to changes with the NPB ball, but he can still hit an insane peak velo for a starting pitcher.
- Stamina: C. He has thrown complete games before, but he’s not generally a workhorse.
- Fatigue Recovery and Injury Recovery: Both E’s. There are players with F ratings in these, but Sasaki definitely has a reputation as a bit fragile. Someone who’s had to be babied a bit in his early career.
- Vs. Runners: Down. Holding runners is not a strength.
- Fastball: E Sharpness, C Control. The fastball has some natural two-seam movement to it, which makes the shape relatively hittable for how stinking fast it is.
- Forkball: A Sharpness, D Control, Level 5 Movement. He won’t always know where it’s going, but the forkball is impossible to hit and has incredible movement.
- Sinking Splitter: A Sharpness, D Control, Level 4 Movement. Another great weapon, with a slightly different movement profile to the forkball.
- Slider: C Sharpness, C Control, Level 4 Movement. Sasaki’s added a slider over the past year. It’s not nearly at the quality of the forkball, but it’s a strong weapon, better than the best breaking ball for about half of the pitchers in Prospi.
How does that compare against some other recent import players? Let’s take a look:
Won’t translate every attribute, but here are some takeaways:
- Roki Sasaki’s arsenal looks broadly similar to 2015 baby Ohtani, though Ohtani had a more highly-rated fastball. They’re coming over at similar positions in their career, though I guarantee Sasaki will not develop into an MVP-winning DH.
- Senga’s “ghost fork” gets an S ranking for sharpness, and is the single best pitch of any of these players.
- Yoshinobu Yamamoto was a clear step above where Sasaki is now as he entered MLB. Sasaki can throw harder and is younger, so there’s a chance his ceiling is higher. But if you believe Prospi, Sasaki is not especially close to as good as Yamamoto yet.
- Sasaki’s overall ratings score is similar to where Kikuchi was on coming to MLB. But adding up all the attribute scores probably overrates an all-around guy with a bunch of pitches like Kikuchi, compared to the raw talent of Sasaki.
More Prospi resources
There’s a growing community building around the graphically impressive new Pro Yakyuu Spirits game. There’s still been no real progress on breaking into the game’s file system, a necessary first step to make a fan translation. But there is a community dedicated to helping each other through the game, on the Prospi Translation Discord.
You’ll need Google Translate to navigate it, but this page is also a great resource for importing real ouendan cheer songs into the game. Fans program the songs with the in-game music creator, and you can import them as image files into your copy of the game, then decide when they should play. Great resource for adding realism to the audio and get a real NPB atmosphere.
Will next year’s games still include real managers?
Plenty of recent games have included real manager names and likenesses, from MLB The Show to MLB Pro Spirit. That may be about to change? Managers and coaches are being removed from MLBPA’s licensing agreement. It sounds like there was some concern about a potential lawsuit from the coaches and staff who don’t get a cut of the licensing dollars.
It will be interesting to see if we go back to generic manager likenesses, or if Sony ponies up to make individual deals with MLB managers outside of the standard MLBPA licensing agreement.
YouTube Viewing Guide
- ’99 Koushien (PS1) Gameplay – The game with the single busiest menus I have ever seen. Graphic design is Magical Company’s passion. Jump to 2:28 in the video if you want to see just one example of this.
- Simulation Pro Yakyuu ’99 (PS1) Gameplay – Bespectacled Yakult Swallows catcher Furuta Atsuya returns for one more console baseball tactics game. The big, expansive menu of manager options in this one is pretty inspiring.
- History in Sports Video Games – Kofie from Secret Base explains something I think about a lot: old sports games are slices of history. And they’re a great way to play around with a sport’s history, if the right features are there.