After all, given Lin Guanglai's achievements in Japan over the past few years, Nomura Katsuhiko is confident that he can negotiate a groundbreaking contract for his player without pitching a single ball—the Major League teams get a top player, the player finds a good place, and SoftBank receives a valuable compensation. It's a "three-win" deal.
But the current problem is that although Lin Guanglai has played four seasons in Nippon Professional Baseball, he is only 21 years old this year and just turning 22 early next year, still categorized as an international under-25.
According to the latest Collective Bargaining Agreement in Major League Baseball, this means that if Lin Guanglai wants to develop in the United States, he must give up his substantial 350 million yen annual salary with SoftBank and sign a minor league contract with a base salary of only $545,000 (approximately 54.5 million yen at the time), and can only get higher wages through salary arbitration after three years.
