Nippon Professional Baseball’s Yomiuri Giants are signing right-hander Spencer Howard, according to multiple reports.
Howard and His Time in Major League Baseball
Howard, 29, was once a promising prospect with the Philadelphia Phillies. Unfortunately, he was unable to translate his minor league success to the majors. Across parts of five MLB seasons with four organizations, he posted a 7.00 ERA with 136 strikeouts in 144 innings. His underlying metrics were somewhat more encouraging, but his performance even slipped at the Triple-A level, where he recorded a 7.07 ERA and 6.20 FIP over 70 innings from 2022 to 2024. This prompted a move to Asia.
Howard joined the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles in 2025 and was generally effective when healthy. However, a slew of smaller injuries limited him to just 48 ⅔ innings across nine starts. He finished 5-1 with a 1.28 ERA+, striking out 18% of hitters against a 6% walk rate. Howard averaged 91.6 mph on his fastball, pairing it with a slider as his primary secondary pitch against right-handed hitters. The righty also had a changeup as his best weapon versus lefties.
The San Luis Obispo product now heads to the Tokyo-based Giants. It is a club working to stabilize its rotation after losing frontline starters Tomoyuki Sugano and Foster Griffin in consecutive winters. With Forrest Whitley and Bryan Mata also signed this offseason, Howard will likely slot in as a back-end starter and should face less pressure to shoulder a heavy innings load than he would have in Rakuten, where a larger workload was necessary.
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PHOTO: Philadelphia Phillies starting pitcher Spencer Howard throws during the first inning of a baseball game against the Washington Nationals, Monday, July 26, 2021, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Laurence Kesterson)
