Hiroki Kuroda's Major League debut Friday night, for the Dodgers against the Padres, was nearly a win-yawn situation.
He was phenomenal, throttling the Padres and slowing general manager Ned Colletti's pulse. In seven innings, he allowed three baserunners -- and, true to his reputation for intolerance, fumed over the third, a single with two outs in the seventh inning of a game he led 7-1. He had only two three-ball counts, while throwing 53 of his 77 pitches for strikes.
"Very impressive," said his manager, Joe Torre. "Didn't seem nervous at all. Very business-like, with no indecision on his part."
Want more? At bat, Kuroda turned a seventh-inning sacrifice situation into a walk, helping set up the Dodgers' six-run tiebreaking surge.
At the same time, the shrill was gone. Notwithstanding a PETCO Park sellout, attracted by the fervent Southern Californian rivalry, there was none of the sideshow theatrics that had greeted prior Japanese arrivals.
Which is the ultimate sign that the Japanese have arrived. Still, perhaps none of the pitchers had ever checked in quite as did Kuroda, whose debut captured the best of both Daisuke Matsuzaka and Hideo Nomo.
In his debut a year ago in Kansas City, Matsuzaka had also gone seven innings, had also allowed one run, while striking out 10 (Kuroda fanned four).
Nomo, in his American bow on May 2, 1995, pitched five shutout innings of one-hit ball against the Giants, but struggled a bit with his control, walking four.
"As the innings went on, I started to feel real confident," said Kuroda, speaking through his interpreter. "I was able to make all my pitches. Plus, [catcher] Russell [Martin] led me along real well."
While the 33-year-old right-hander was startlingly good, the lack of commotion surrounding his coming-out was even more startling -- in a good way. Gradually, transitions by Japanese standouts are going from phenomena to part of a routine process.
The San Diego media relations folks reported issuing credentials to about two dozen Japanese media. Nothing like Boston's Box-Lunch Brigade of last year, when the crush of Japanese journalists following Matsuzaka shut down overburdened press room kitchens coast-to-coast.
So, mangling the well-known historical declaration, this was one giant step for Kuroda, one small leap for Japanese ballplayers.
Let's just say there was no hyperventilation when Kuroda faced the second man in the Padres lineup, Tadahito Iguchi. A shrug when compared to a year ago, when the needle on the seminal-moment meter went haywire for Dice-K's first stateside run-in with Ichiro Suzuki.
We can't imagine how long Kuroda had anticipated this evening, this opportunity to pitch on baseball's grandest stage. But we know how long it took him to realize he would like pitching here.
Two innings. Six batters. That sixth batter, Khalil Greene, ripped a screamer to straightaway right, sending Matt Kemp back toward the warning track, where he reached up to make a rather routine backhanded grab.
Having made his home in Hiroshima Municipal Stadium, with its 300 feet to the right-field fence, Kuroda wasn't used to seeing such a long drive not end up in a spectator's lap.
"It's a lot bigger park than the ones I played in in Japan," said Kuroda, before flashing a humble smile. "But then [Brian] Giles homered off me, so there's nothing I can say about that."
In the sixth, Giles introduced him to the little porch that juts out of the right-field corner. Fireworks released the smoke in which Kuroda's first lead went up. But the smoke blew over as quickly as the thought that Kuroda's excellence might go unrewarded.
"I really regretted that pitch," Kuroda said of the 2-0 fastball to the San Diego right fielder. "But I knew we had good hitters on our team, and that they could come back for the win."
Kuroda getting the win himself seemed a little more remote, even to him. He had thrown only 64 pitches though six innings, but this was his first regular-season start, circumstances which encourage managers to be cautious.
"I didn't think I'd be able to win this early in the season," agreed Kuroda.
Torre said he would have considered pinch-hitting for Kuroda only if his turn came with a man on third and less than two outs. Instead, it came with a man on first and one out, and the walk he coaxed from Padres reliever Joe Thatcher threw gasoline on the simmering rally.
One 2-0 meatball to Giles. As blemishes on a mini-masterpiece go, not much.
"He has a good running sinker," Giles said, "and I probably chased it a bit. In the third at-bat [in the sixth], he's not going to want to walk anyone. He's got a lead. He just left the ball over the plate."
Doesn't matter if you are coming from Japan. Or just from the Grapefruit League. Pitching seven innings at the expense of three baserunners is a remarkable No. 1.
The Dodgers did not know what to hope for. They got more than they could expect.
"This is a big day for him. He's been aspiring for this for a long time," Colletti had said before the game. "So I'm sure he is excited."
By the end, there was a lot for everyone to be excited about. The Dodgers, by how well their new guy had pitched. Everyone else able to recognize the assimilation of Japanese players as a good thing, by the serenity in which he could do it.
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