Right-hander Genei Sato, days short of his 21st birthday, is progressing toward a potential first-round selection in the 2026 Nippon Professional Baseball Draft. He has something else in mind.
According to several reports, Sato, a third-year student at Sendai University in Shibata, Japan, plans to transfer to a school in the United States in February 2026 with the intent of declaring for the 2027 MLB Draft.
This would be an atypical path for a Japanese player to take to the Majors; most now come via the posting system, introduced in the late 1990s. However, players not under an NPB contract -- like Sato -- are not subject to the rules of that system, which has led a growing number to consider playing college ball in the U.S. instead.
Although not the first to make the jump, Sato is still blazing a trail. Rintaro Sasaki -- the first Japanese high schooler to choose the NCAA over the NPB -- is still only a sophomore at Stanford. (Two-way player Kenny Ishikawa, who enrolled at Seattle University after beginning his collegiate career in Japan, will be suiting up for the Georgia Bulldogs this spring.)
As detailed by Baseball America, Sato -- measuring at a relatively slight 6 feet and 180 pounds -- is already throwing a high-90s fastball alongside a low-90s splitter. His repertoire also includes a slider, although evaluators haven’t seen much of it yet.
Sato won’t be coming into his American collegiate career blind. In addition to his plans to play summer ball in 2026, he already has experience facing top NCAA hitters, having pitched in the Japan-USA Collegiate Baseball Championship Series earlier this year against a Team USA lineup littered with potential first-rounders. He can, in fact, already boast strikeouts against Roch Cholowsky (MLB Pipeline's top Draft prospect), Drew Burress (No. 5) and A.J. Gracia (No. 15).
“He’s real,” Cholowsky told Baseball America. “[He] was like 97-99, throwing a splitter at like 92. A lot of ride on the fastball. Throws his splitter hard but has depth on it, too.”