These words come from the GM of a Nippon Professional Baseball team who has watched Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters phenom Shohei Otani develop over the past two seasons and is also very familiar with the abilities of Miami Marlins sensation Fernandez, who went down with a torn ligament earlier this year.
What makes the comments even more provocative is that Otani is 23 months younger than the Cuban star. After making a splash in the fall of 2012 by asking NPB clubs not to draft him because he wanted to go straight to play for a major league team, Otani was strong-armed by family and the baseball establishment in Japan and relented.
But with each game it seems as if his departure for North America could come sooner rather than later. The 6-4, 190-pound right-hander is 9-1 this season with an ERA of 2.14 and a WHIP of 1.06. Earlier this month he struck out 16 batters in a complete-game victory over the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles (Masahiro Tanaka’s old team).