This story was excerpted from Ian Browne's Red Sox Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

Thursday marks the 17th anniversary of a crazy day in Red Sox history, one that fans would love to see duplicated or bested in a matter of days.

Dec. 14, 2006, was the day the Red Sox closed the deal with Daisuke Matsuzaka, reaching a contract worth $52 million over six years just prior to the close of their 30-day negotiating window with him. Throw in the blind posting fee of $51.1 million, and Boston was the heavyweight champion of the Matsuzaka sweepstakes by going $103.3 million deep.

This isn’t about how Matsuzaka’s career turned out. But if you want a brief synopsis, he was good the first year when the Sox won the 2007 World Series, better the second year when he finished fourth in the American League Cy Young Award voting, then injured and mediocre over the final four years of the deal.

The moral of the story is that Boston, led by general manager Theo Epstein’s doggedness and the financial support of ownership, won those sweepstakes.

The Red Sox are now pursuing another Japanese star righty. His name is Yoshinobu Yamamoto, and he is drawing even more competition for his services than Matsuzaka did all those years ago.

One of the reasons is that through technology, it is far easier for analytics departments to get a handle on how a Japanese pitcher’s stuff will translate into the Major Leagues.

Back in Matsuzaka's days, the talk was of a gyroball, a pitch that most thought was more myth than fact. By the way, that mysterious pitch never did show up at Fenway Park.

But the data is so good on the 25-year-old Yamamoto that all the big players are in for this final round.

This includes the Yankees (fresh off trading for Juan Soto), the Dodgers (even after signing Shohei Ohtani and perhaps getting close to a trade for Tyler Glasnow), the Mets (who are never shy about spending under owner Steve Cohen) and the Blue Jays (reportedly the runners-up for Ohtani). The Giants might also still be in the mix. And, yes, the Red Sox, with MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand reporting that they have a meeting set up with Yamamoto in the coming days.

All that said, the prevailing feeling in media circles is that the Yankees, Dodgers and Mets are the most likely destinations for Yamamoto.

But that’s no reason for the Red Sox to decelerate at all in these negotiations until they are ruled out.

You can make the case that none of the finalists need Yamamoto as badly as the Red Sox do. Boston’s pitching, to be frank, hasn’t been good at all the past two seasons. The Sox have finished last in the loaded American League East in back-to-back seasons, and Yamamoto could give them instant credibility again.

At the outset of the offseason, the day new chief baseball officer Craig Breslow was hired, Red Sox chairman Tom Werner said that his team would be going “full throttle” this winter. Yamamoto would be the definition of a full-throttle move.

The Red Sox have some things that might ease Yamamoto's transition.

Here are a couple:

Koji, Dice-K, Tazawa, Okajima and, oh yeah, Yoshida
Koji Uehara, the man who closed out the 2013 World Series for the Red Sox with a strikeout, is revered by Japanese pitchers. He can’t wipe the smile off his face when he reminisces about his four years in Boston. Matsuzaka, even though his MLB career didn’t come close to what he accomplished in Japan, liked Boston so much he lived there for many years after his time with the Red Sox ended. Junichi Tazawa and Hideki Okajima were ace setup men for Boston title teams who thrived in the environment. Like Uehara and Matsuzaka, they enjoyed the experience of pitching for the Red Sox. All those men not only liked the environment of playing in Boston, but they loved the city and cited it as being comfortable for Japanese players.

Outfielder Masataka Yoshida signed with the Red Sox last winter after being posted by the Orix Buffaloes, where he and Yamamoto played most of their NPB careers together. That would be a comfortable reunion.

State-of-the-art pitching program
Under Breslow, the Sox are completely revamping their pitching infrastructure. Not only did Breslow get rave reviews for developing the pitching program with the Cubs, but he has brought in a couple of other gurus with similar respect throughout the game. Justin Willard is the new director of pitching, and his work with the Twins in getting the max out of the arms he worked with was well known. Rounding out the trio is pitching coach Andrew Bailey, who earned a reputation with the Giants as someone who could blend his experiences as a Major League pitcher with analytics. Yamamoto could benefit from Boston’s new pitching lab.