Shōta Imanaga’s Camp Pushing Notion That Hamstring Hampered Second Half

Shōta Imanaga‘s sweeper was his best pitch this past season, so it makes sense that his camp is putting some spin on his second-half performance as he heads to free agency. While there are still some procedural details to work out that could keep the lefty in Chicago for 2026 and even further, the Cubs declined their three-year extension option and he turned down a $15 million guarantee for next season.

He can’t negotiate with other teams until after 4pm CT on Thursday, which is also the deadline for teams to extend qualifying offers to eligible players, but his reps already appear to be burnishing his image. Imanaga allowed 31 homers, tied for fourth-most in MLB, despite pitching only 144.2 innings for the Cubs. A whopping 20 of those dingers came over his last 12 regular-season starts, followed by three more in two postseason appearances.

There had already been a lot of talk about whether a hamstring strain that cost him nearly eight weeks in May and June may have contributed to his futility, so this isn’t a new concept. And he did serve up four taters with only 14 strikeouts over his last four starts of the first half after returning from the injury. But he also went 3-1 with a 2.31 ERA over that short span. That’s a far cry from his 3-5 record with a 4.70 ERA before eventually becoming so unreliable that the Cubs opted not to use him at all in their do-or-die Game 5 NLCS battle with the Brewers.

Between his performance, the fact that picking up his option would have engaged a full no-trade clause, and the potential to spend (some of) that money elsewhere, declining his option was the easiest decision Jed Hoyer will make this offseason. Bruce Levine echoed those thoughts during a Tuesday morning appearance on the Mully & Haugh Show (40:54), tossing in a nod to the hammy.

“Which version of Shōta Imanaga are we looking at right now, and were [the Cubs] gonna gamble on the fact that he was never really the same pitcher coming back after he injured his hamstring?” Levine asked. “So, with this in mind, a $58 million commitment for the next three years is not where they wanna go…

“It’s not a slam dunk that they’re gonna offer him a qualifying offer because maybe they want to use that $22 million resource for another pitcher like Dylan Cease.”

I’ll let you decide for yourself whether the idea of reallocating funds is as much of a Charlie Brown football as the Cubs ponying up for long-term superstar contracts, but it’s clear they’ll need to replace Imanaga in some fashion. And hey, they could end up bringing him back on a restructured deal. Again, though, there does appear to be some proactive PR taking place.

Unless this is just a matter of Jon Morosi borrowing from Levine, and I don’t think that’s the case, media members are definitely being given a message.

“On the flip side, Imanaga believes that with some corrections and adjustments to that second half…it seemed as though Imanaga may have come back early from that lower body injury that may have affected his effectiveness there in the second half,” Morosi said Tuesday morning. “So, with a full offseason, Imanaga and his camp believe that he’ll be able to have much more first-half-of-2025 and really all of 2024 type season for him now going forward.

“So there’s a belief that a two- or three-year deal could be out there for him.”

I’d be surprised if a three-year deal was really out there, and even a two-year deal for more than $30 million guaranteed feels like a bit of a stretch. That’s a little less than what Imanaga could have had with the Cubs if he’d picked up his $15.25 million player option, which would have triggered another back-and-forth next season. The numbers listed here are a little different from what I’d previously noted, as I neglected to include the $250,000 escalators to each year due to Imanaga’s top-5 Cy Young finish in 2024.

If Shane Bieber picking up his $16 million player option with the Blue Jays is any indication, the market may not look kindly on Imanaga’s choice. While it could just be that Bieber loves it in Toronto, turning down what would have been a $4 million buyout to play one season ahead of the black cloud of labor dispute in 2027 looks quite peculiar on the surface. Bieber is almost two years younger than Imanaga and has a Cy Young to his credit, so he’d have been a far more attractive option for most teams.

Even if Bieber’s decision had nothing to do with the pending market, no amount of positive spin on Imanaga’s performance will keep teams from raising red flags about his health. As much as we all like to get up in arms about the way the Cubs have treated injuries — or not treated them — they have a far greater understanding of their players’ health than anyone else.

“If a team makes a curious contract decision on a player that’s been playing for them, remember they have access to a player’s daily medical history and will undoubtedly be in close contact with the athletic training staff about projected health down the road,” former Cub Robert Stock tweeted recently. “Are they always right? Of course not. They just have more information than we do.”

This particular decision wasn’t curious to most who viewed it with the right perspective, but his point stands.

Imanaga will obviously have to pass a physical in order to earn a new deal with any team, but the bigger issue is whether or not clubs will believe his disastrous stretch run was a product of his health. He’s always been a fly-ball pitcher and the Cubs were well aware of those dangers when they signed him. The problem this past season was that his whiff and strikeout rates were down as his fastball lost both velocity and effectiveness.

His four-seam sat just under 91 mph, down almost a full tick from his first season in Chicago, and it also had over an inch less ride. The heater also had a little more two-seam shape, getting almost two more inches of arm-side movement. Imanaga’s velocity being down across the board didn’t hurt his sweeper, which was exponentially more successful than last season. However, that meant little when it only accounted for 8% of his repertoire. The fastball and splitter saw huge year-over-year drops in value, even if the latter offering was still very solid relative to similar pitches.

I don’t doubt that the hammy was a hindrance to some extent, and I’m wondering if most of that could have been psychological. After all, it was the first time in his life that Imanaga had experienced any kind of leg injury. Even if he was fully recovered, any sort of uncertainty about whether the leg would hold up could have led to him unintentionally dialing back his intent after returning. That’s pure speculation on my part, but I think it could hold water.

Anyway, we’ll find out very soon what the next steps are for Imanaga and the Cubs.