Kazuhiro Kuroda (黒田一博, September 13, 1924 – August 17, 2007) was a Japanese professional

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

centerfielder A center fielder, abbreviated CF, is the outfielder in baseball who plays defense in center field – the baseball and softball fielding position between left field and right field. In the numbering system used to record defensive plays, the ce ...

Nippon Professional Baseball or NPB is the highest level of baseball in Japan. Locally, it is often called , meaning ''Professional Baseball''. Outside Japan, it is often just referred to as "Japanese baseball". The roots of the league can be traced back to the formation ...

(NPB).

Career

Kuroda attended Sasebo Shogyo High School. Kuroda was a center fielder for eight years in NPB. He debuted with the 1949

Nankai Hawks The are a Japanese professional baseball team based in Fukuoka, Fukuoka Prefecture. They compete in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) as a member of the Pacific League. The team was formerly known as the Nankai Hawks and was based in Osaka. ...

, hitting .324/.360/.408 in 51 games, mostly as a bench player. In 1950, Kuroda hit .257/.282/.405 in his first year as a regular, then he batted .259/.279/.382 the next season. In 1952, Kazuhiro had a .241/.263/.324 year and he finished his Nankai run at .246/.287/.322 in 1953. Kuroda was taken in the expansion draft by the new

Takahashi Unions The were a Japanese team in Nippon Professional Baseball. A Pacific League expansion team in 1954, they were brought into the league to increase the number of teams to eight. The team was stocked with players from the other Pacific League teams, i ...

and hit .246/.290/.334 their first year. In 1955, he slipped to .237/.269/.307, then he finished his career by going just 7 for 62 for the 1956

Daiei Stars The were a Japanese professional baseball team that was founded in 1946, and played in various incarnations until 1957, when it merged with another team. Overall, the franchise only had three winning seasons, never rising higher than third place ...

. Overall, his batting line read .246/.279/.340.

Retirement

After retiring, he opened a sports store and was active in

Little League Little League Baseball and Softball (officially, Little League Baseball Inc) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization 1964 Olympics 1964 Olympics refers to both: *The 1964 Winter Olympics The 1964 Winter Olympics, officially known as the IX Olympic Winter Games (german: IX. Olympische Winterspiele) and commonly known as Innsbruck 1964 ( bar, Innschbruck 1964, label=Austro-Ba ...

in the

shot put The shot put is a track and field event involving "putting" (throwing) a heavy spherical ball—the ''shot''—as far as possible. The shot put competition for men has been a part of the modern Olympics since their revival in 1896, and women's ...

. His son,

Hiroki is a common masculine Japanese given name. It can be written in many ways. In the following lists, the kanji in parentheses are the individual's way of writing the name Hiroki. Possible writings Hiroki can be written using different kanji charac ...

, pitched in NPB and

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

.LaRue, Larry
"M’s deal Broussard, keep Ramirez,"
''The News Tribune'' (December 12, 2007).

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kuroda, Kazuhiro 1924 births 2007 deaths Baseball people from Nagasaki Prefecture People from Sasebo Japanese baseball players Nippon Professional Baseball outfielders Daiei Stars players Takahashi Unions players Nankai Hawks players