The Toronto Blue Jays are among the teams who have expressed interest in a free-agent pitcher. In other news, water is wet.

Jon Morosi appeared on MLB Network on Monday and reported that there are a number of different teams who are scouting Kodai Senga “very intensely.” The list of teams that Morosi mentioned are the Blue Jays, the Los Angeles Angels and Dodgers, the Texas Rangers, and the Seattle Mariners.

Senga is the top Japanese free agent on the market this winter, and perhaps the most hyped pitcher to come out of Japan since Shohei Ohtani came overseas back in 2017. He generated a lot of hype for himself with a strong performance for Japan at the World Baseball Classic in 2017 but hasn’t been made available to Major League clubs because his NPB team, the Fukuoka Softbank Hawks, are philosophically opposed to using the posting system.

In 2022, Senga posted a 1.94 ERA over the course of 22 appearances. He struck out 9.8 batters per nine innings and walked 3.1 per nine. Senga relies on a four-pitch mix, with a fastball that averages 96 miles per hour but has apparently touched as high as 102. He also has an off-speed weapon that’s referred to as a “ghost fork.”

An interesting thing about Senga is that he isn’t a traditional Japanese free agent whom Major League teams need to use the posting system to negotiate with. He opted out of his contract with Fukuoka this winter and is available to all teams as an international free agent.

The word is that Senga would like to play for a big-market team that’s in win-now mode, and the Blue Jays check both of those boxes.