Let's be honest for a moment: If Masahiro Tanaka were American, there would've long ago been riots within the baseball world about the manifold abuses on his right arm. Managers would've been under fire, biomechanical experts would've screamed limbicide and the prevailing story about his free agency wouldn't be the massive bidding war it is currently inspiring. It would focus on just how many years the club that signs him will get before his elbow or shoulder cry uncle.

Inside front offices around baseball, Tanaka-mania is brewing and almost certain to wind up with the 25-year-old right-hander landing a $100 million contract on top of the $20 million posting fee due his team in Japan, the Rakuten Golden Eagles. The fervor is not entirely contagious. A number of executives surveyed by Yahoo Sports copped to a mild case of fear borne of what we think we know, which is that a lot of pitches do not bode well for the long-term health of an arm. Granted, our actual knowledge of the arm remains in its embryonic stages, and the whole what-we-think-we-know thing may turn out to be complete bunk.

[Related: Red Sox might "quietly slip into" the bidding for Tanaka]

Still, that is what guides the market today, and so here is the reality about Tanaka on the minds of teams interested and not: Over the last five years, he has averaged more pitches per start, 113.3, than any pitcher in the major leagues. The closest is Justin Verlander at 112.9 and Felix Hernandez ranks second at 106.5. And it's not just the per-game haul. Some of the individual outings Tanaka has logged horrify the pitch-count phobes.

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There were the 742 pitches Tanaka threw over six starts in a two-week span as a 17-year-old at the national high school baseball tournament. And the back-to-back 137- and 142-pitch starts at 20 years old. The coup de grace came during the Japan Series this season, in which Tanaka went 160 pitches during a Game 6 loss, then came back the next day and threw another 15 in relief to close out Rakuten's championship victory.

Lauded in Japan for his courage and tenacity, Tanaka came off to judicious front offices as reckless.

"It worries me a lot," one NL executive said.

"Not ideal," one general manager said.

"There is definitely reason for concern," another GM said.

Since 2009, only Edwin Jackson and Tim Lincecum have exceeded 140 pitches in MLB, and those were in no-hitters. Tanaka topped 140 three times. He went 130 or more in 15 of 123 starts. In 24,300 starts over the last five years, all major league pitchers have gone 130-plus a combined 23 times. Tanaka has nearly twice the 125-plus-pitch starts of the next-highest pitcher (31 to Verlander's 18) and his 50 120-plus outings tops Verlander's 45.

"Unless he's an outlier," one of the GMs said, "just a tough thing to bet on."

He acknowledged a simple truth, however, that applies to Tanaka, or any high-impact free agent, really: Interested teams, even smart ones, suspend rational thought in pursuit of diamonds that may well have large and visible inclusions. Every team in baseball loves Tanaka's stuff, and that blinds many to the other stuff like wear and tear on his arm. His 91-mph fastball plays up because of the command. His split-fingered fastball may well be the best in the world. As blogger Clint Hulsey showed, Tanaka's arsenal is wide and deep, enough to inspire the rare cross-cultural comparison: prime Dan Haren, who was a high-strikeout, low-walk, innings-eating workhorse.

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