Diamondbacks left-hander Yuhei Nakaushiro gave up a pair of line drives, threw as many balls as strikes and admitted later he was battling his nerves, but his spring-training debut went in the books as a perfect eighth inning on Saturday afternoon.
For American fans, Nakaushiro is an unknown, a 27-year-old reliever who popped up in the Diamondbacks farm system last year and logged a dominant 29 1/3 innings. But, in his native Japan, he is both a flop and a last hope at keeping an obscure-yet-sort-of-interesting streak alive.
Starting with Los Angeles Dodgers right-hander Hideo Nomo in 1995, every major league season – 22 years in a row – has featured at least one Japanese player making his major league debut.