Former Dodgers pitcher Hiroki Kuroda was voted into the Japan Baseball Corridor of Fame on Thursday, after a 20-year profession cut up between the Hiroshima Toyo Carp, Dodgers and Yankees.
From the Japan Instances:
The 15 straight hitters in 2005 tied for the Central League with Tsuyoshi Shimoyanagi of the Hanshin Tigers. A yr later, Kuroda posted a CL-best 1.85 ERA.
“I need to specific my gratitude to everybody,” Kuroda, 48, mentioned. “I confronted greater than 10,000 batters throughout my profession. I labored so much with teammates and in opposition to opponents. Many individuals participated in my profession. Many followers cheered me on.”
Kuroda is the second Dodgers pitcher to be voted into the Japan Baseball Corridor of Fame, becoming a member of Hideo Nomo, who was inducted in 2014.
Kuroda, then 33, signed a three-year, $35.3 million contract with the Dodgers in December 2007 after pitching 11 seasons for Hiroshima, and adopted it up with a $12 million one-year contract with Los Angeles in in 2011.
In his 4 years with the Dodgers, Kuroda was stable within the beginning rotation with a 3.45 and 113 ERA+, averaging 175 innings every season. Kuroda from 2008-11 ranked third on the group in video games (114), innings (699) and strikeouts (523), behind Chad Billingsley and Clayton Kershaw, in that order, in every class.
Kuroda beat the Cubs in Sport 3 of the 2008 NLDS to finish a sweep, then beat the Phillies in Sport 3 of that yr's NLCS, the Dodgers' solely win of that collection.
To indicate what a special period it was for Dodgers baseball, that NLDS in opposition to the Cubs was the group's first postseason collection win in 20 years. From 1989 to 2015, Kuroda in 2008 was the one Dodgers pitcher to win multiple sport in a single postseason.
Kuroda's time with the Dodgers ended smack dab in the midst of the absurdity of the McCourt Period, with basic supervisor Ned Colletti given scraps to work with, and he opted to unfold what Kuroda might have earned over a handful of common veterans. Kuroda as an alternative signed with the Yankees, for whom he pitched three extra seasons.
In seven years within the majors with the Dodgers and Yankees, Kuroda posted an above-average ERA+ each season, and averaged 30 begins and 188 innings per season. Amongst Japanese-born gamers within the majors, Kuroda ranks third in begins (211), innings (1,319) and wins (79) — trailing solely Nomo and Yu Darvish — and is fourth in strikeouts (986).
After his time with the Yankees, Kuroda returned to Japan for 2 extra seasons with Hiroshima, finishing a 20-year profession that noticed him win 203 video games with a 3.51 ERA.
