Roki Sasakis finalists emerge after Yankees, Mets told theyre out of race

Roki Sasaki is narrowing down his choices — and it’s bad news for both local teams. The Yankees and Mets were each told the 23-year-old Japanese right-hander won’t be signing with them, The Post confirmed. The three teams remaining on Sasaki’s list are the Dodgers, Padres and Blue Jays, The Post’s Jon Heyman confirmed. Sasaki generated enormous interest throughout this past season before he was posted.Other teams he has eliminated from consideration include the Cubs, Rangers and Giants. All this comes in advance of the signing period for international free agents, which begins Wednesday. Many around the league considered the Yankees and Mets as long-shots all along for Sasaki, who starred in Japan and was posted by his former team, the Chiba Lotte Marines of Nippon Professional Baseball, prior to the start of the Winter Meetings. Since the hard-throwing Sasaki isn’t yet 25, he’s classified by MLB as an international amateur and therefore teams are limited to their international bonus pool in terms of what they can offer him — generally around $6 million — much like Shohei Ohtani’s situation when he went to the Angels in 2018. For much of the process, the Dodgers and Padres have been seen as the favorites for Sasaki, who idolized San Diego’s Yu Darvish when he was younger and could join a rotation in Los Angeles that will include Shohei Ohtani and Yoshinobu Yamamoto this season. “He’s obviously a tremendous talent,” Yankees GM Brian Cashman said of Sasaki last month.

“It’d be nice to have Yankee Stadium be his home, but the decision will be up to him.All we can do is share everything and anything that we can about ourselves and what we provide.” But as was the case with Ohtani and Yamamoto — who signed the most lucrative contract given to a pitcher in MLB history a year ago at 12 years and $325 million — the Yankees weren’t able to land Sasaki. Without Sasaki, the Yankees have a rotation of Gerrit Cole, Max Fried, C...