First base traditionally is one of the most productive offensive positions for baseball teams. While first basemen are not as offensively productive as they once were, last season, first basemen were on average four percent better at generating runs than the average major league player.
The Nationals, though, have had a black hole at first base. Their offseason acquisition, Nathaniel Lowe, now plays for the Red Sox, and Josh Bell has not lived up to his career averages. With no clear first base prospect in the Nationals’ minor league system as well, Washington should look across the Pacific for power production and pursue Japanese slugger Munetaka Murakami this offseason.
Murakami is a star for the Tokyo Yakult Swallows in Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball Organization. Throughout eight seasons in Japan, he has a .945 on-base plus slugging percentage and 262 home runs. Murakami has also become prominent thanks to his performance in the 2023 World Baseball Classic. Murakami, notably, hit a two-run walk-off double against Mexico to send the Japanese team to the finals.
Murakami has built upon his impressive track record with an astonishing 2025 campaign. The slugger unfortunately injured his oblique in mid-April and has missed about half of the season. However, that has not stopped him from hitting 19 home runs in just 42 games played. He is already fifth in home runs in the league despite having less than half the plate appearances of his contemporaries. The NPB is currently in a “dead-ball era” with offensive output across the league at all-time lows. Still, Murakami is hitting at a prolific rate in this low-offensive environment.
To play in the MLB next season, Murakami needs to be posted by his team, the Swallows. The MLB posting system stipulates that if a Japanese team posts a player, the player has a 45-day window to negotiate and sign with all 30 Major League clubs. If the player reaches an agreement with an American club, the stateside team must pay the Japanese teams a release fee of up to 20 million dollars on top of what the team intends to pay the player. Industry experts in Japan say that they expect the Swallows to post Murakami this offseason.
Murakami makes too much sense to add to the rebuilding Nationals roster. The Japanese lefty fills a clear hole in the Nationals roster. Since Ryan Zimmerman, the Nationals have had no clear solution at first base, and Murakami can be that solution. Murakami is also only 25 this season, meaning the Nationals can acquire a fully developed product in their physical prime.
Murakami can also help the existing Nationals core develop. With Murakami providing middle-of-the-order protection, pitchers may be more willing to throw strikes to hitters like James Wood. Wood and other hitters would have more opportunity to do damage with the threat of Murakami behind them in the order, potentially helping Wood cut down on his mounting strikeout totals.
As with all players coming from Japan, there is a risk attached to signing Murakami. For one, he has a 29 percent strikeout rate in the NPB this season and has always had a high strikeout rate. Players who strike out a lot in the NPB are likely to strike out even more against steeper competition in the MLB. However, Murakami has elite power and is a finished product the Nationals are not close to having anywhere in their system. It is time for the Nationals front office to take steps to make a competitive ball club, and Murakami should be a part of that.