Hideo Nomo

Hideo Nomo, born in 1968, professional baseball player, who became the first Japanese player in more than 30 years to join a major league team when he pitched for the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1995. That season he won National League (NL) rookie of the year honors. A celebrity in Japan, Nomo also became popular with Asian American fans in Los Angeles and elsewhere in the United States.

Nomo was born in Osaka. In 1988 he won a silver medal at the Olympic Games in Seoul, South Korea, as a member of the Japanese national baseball team. He was also successful in the professional ranks. Known as the Tornado because of his unconventional pitching motion, he recorded 1,000 strikeouts in fewer seasons than any other pitcher in the history of Japanese professional baseball. While playing for the Kintetsu Buffaloes, he won the Japanese Pacific League’s most valuable player (MVP) award in 1990.

The Dodgers signed Nomo on February 8, 1995. He made his major league debut on May 2, 1995, against the San Francisco Giants. He was the first Japanese player to appear in the major leagues since Masanori Murakami played for the San Francisco Giants in 1964 and 1965. As a rookie, Nomo registered a 2.54 earned run average (ERA), led the NL in strikeouts with 236, and earned a spot on the NL All-Star team.

In Nomo’s second season he pitched a no-hitter against the Colorado Rockies on September 17, 1996. For the season he struck out 234 batters and registered a 3.14 ERA. In the middle of the 1998 season the Dodgers traded Nomo to the New York Mets, who released him before the 1999 season. Nomo then had a brief stint with the Chicago Cubs organization before signing with the Milwaukee Brewers early in the 1999 season. Nomo pitched for the Detroit Tigers in 2000 and the Boston Red Sox in 2001, having mixed success. He returned to the Dodgers in 2002 and posted a 16-6 win-loss record, the best of his major league career.