Yoshitoki Ono (2-3, 7.49) wants to be traded from the Lupin Cliffhanger baseball franchise. “I feel like I can still start,” said the 36-year-old. “I’ve got the pitches, and the arm is as good as ever.” The right-hander appeared in 20 games for the Cliff Hangers last season, 17 of them in relief. “It’s clear that the team and I am not on the same sheet of papyrus.”

“We’ll do everything we can to accommodate Yoshitoki’s request,” said new GM Ron Collins at a luncheon session scheduled to meet fans, though it was obvious news of Ono’s desire had caught him off-guard.

Another member of the Lupin front office representative who spoke anonymously said “Is Ono freakin’ insane? He pitched himself out of the starting rotation with a 5.91 ERA effort in 2017, then followed that up with a 7.49 last year? Yet somehow has the impression that he’s a starter. I guess that’s the power of agents.”

This move is even more surprising because Ono is entering the last two seasons of a huge contract that includes team options of over $5M a season through 2020. One suspects that Ono is really baiting the club to give him his release, which may well be what Collins meant when he said they would do everything possible to accommodate Ono’s request.

This represents the second player in the Cliffhanger stable to speak openly and in harsh terms about the club as fellow pitcher Katsumi Okano recently got into a kerfuffle with bloggers over their insistence that he do the honorable thing and take a pay cut. Amid rumors of league instability and internal strife, this off-season promises to be an interesting one to watch from the vantage point of the Lupin fanbase.