Hiroki Kuroda might have only been a .500 pitcher, but he had a sneaky good (and pretty durable) 7 year run from his mid to late 30's in the MLB.
...and he wasn't a really highly touted phenom coming out of Japan. Just a solid pitcher.
Maybe not always perennial Cy Young contenders, but a lot of these Japanese pitchers are considered seasoned and reliable enough to plug right into a rotation or bullpen somewhere.
We've come a long way in scouting and evaluating these guys (both physically and mentally) since the unmitigated disaster that was Hideki Irabu. A heartbreaking story in retrospect, of a guy who never really wanted to leave his country.
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