Happy New Year to baseball fans around the globe. The calendar year 2025 is upon us, and here are five bold predictions for some headlines we may see in international baseball next year.
Jake Cave is an MLB veteran heading to Korea for the upcoming baseball season. This past season with the Colorado Rockies, he batted .251 and had the most at-bats of any season in his career.
Cave’s batting average from the 2024 season is the best in his career since 2019. His 37 RBI a season ago is also his second-highest mark in his career.
Since Cave got a bit of his rhythm back hitting the baseball, he may be an impact player for a Doosan Bears team that finished 4th in the KBO last season and made the wild-card round.
The Rakuten Monkeys more than likely have a starter spot open for Jonathan Bermudez heading into the 2025 season.
Bermudez recently caught the international baseball world’s attention during Premier12. He started for Puerto Rico against the United States and recorded six strikeouts while giving up just two hits and one walk.
He will join a team that had its fair share of big-time starters last season. Marcelo Martinez had the second-best ERA in the CPBL at 2.04. His teammate Pedro Fernandez had a top-ten ERA in the league at 3.50. Both Martinez and Fernandez made 49 combined starts.
This allows the Monkeys to compete with the Uni-Lions for the best pitching staff in the CPBL. The Lions had three pitchers that ranked in the top five in the league in ERA. This included the league’s overall leader in ERA, Gu Lin Ruei Yang.
Diablos Rojos won the LMB title thanks to some big names from this past season, such as Trevor Bauer and Robinson Canó.
With the players they have, who’s to say they cannot go out and win it again? Diablos Rojos had three of the top ten hitters in the league last season, including Canó, Lewin Díaz, and José Marmolejos.
Trevor Bauer’s pitching was also outstanding. He ranked second in the LMB in ERA and was named pitcher of the year in the league. Erick Leal was another great starter for Diablos. In 2024, he ranked fourth in the league in ERA with a 2.91.
If Diablos Rojos can maintain the players they had from 2024. They can bring home the title in the LMB again in 2025. A back-to-back champion has not been seen in the league since 2009 and 2010, when Saraperos de Saltillo did it.
Tomoyuki Sugano spent a decade in the NPB playing for the Yomiuri Giants. The accolades to his name have made him a fan favorite in Japan. He finished his career with 136 wins and over 1,500 strikeouts.
In 2024, he came out of the bullpen and recorded 15 wins with a 1.67 ERA. That ERA is the second-best out of any season he spent with Yomiuri.
The Baltimore Orioles signed him to a one-year deal to help boost the starting rotation. It is a starting rotation that lost Corbin Burnes.
This clears up space for Sugano to fall into the number one spot in the Orioles’ starting rotation. A signing can still be made to find the number one starter; however, it is a role that the former Yomiuri Giant can fill.
The Giants finished last season as the number-one pitching team in the NPB’s Central League. Their team ERA sat at 2.49.
A big signing was made for the team in former Chunichi Dragons closer Raidel Martínez. He had some nasty stuff last season, recording 43 saves on a 1.09 ERA. He also had 59 strikeouts and just 12 walks in 59.0 innings.
Yomiuri was already the best pitching team in the Central League. However, with additions like Martínez, they can become the best pitching team in Nippon.
This will be key as the team searches for their first championship since 2012.
