The right-handed ace of the Saitama Seibu Lions of Nippon Professional Baseball, who recently was posted and has until Jan. 2 to sign with an MLB team, declared that he has no interest in joining San Francisco’s archrival Los Angeles Dodgers, in a recent interview with former big-league pitcher Daisuke Matsuzaka on the "Hodo Station” show.

"Of course, I’d enjoy playing alongside [Shohei] Ohtani , [Yoshinobu] Yamamoto , and [Rōki] Sasaki , but winning against a team like that and becoming a world champion would be the most valuable thing in my life,” Imai told Matsuzaka ( h/t MLB.com’s Michael Clair and Ayako Oikawa ).

“If anything, I'd rather take them down."

That mentality must intrigue Giants president of baseball operations Buster Posey .

Imai, 27, is coming off a domina

See Full Page