Kuroda, Saito, and everybody else that followed behind him, I think it really made them comfortable or confident about performing the major leagues, and a lot of those guys I’ve talked to personally about this, basically they told me that because Nomo-san did it, we knew that there might be a chance, that we could succeed there. And it kind of basically called him a bridge across the Pacific. He built the bridge and we were just able to go across it and you can tell even Kuroda, you can talk to him today and he’ll tell you right now, “if Hideo Nomo wasn’t here probably I wouldn’t be here either.”
País: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum
Entrevista
Acey Kohrogi, exdirector del Departamento de Operaciones de Asia de los Dodgers de Los Ángeles y asistente de Peter O’Malley (dueño de los Dodgers) durante 20 años, ocupa actualmente el cargo de jefe del Departamento de Operaciones de Asia para la agencia deportiva MVP Sports Group. Kohrogi trabajó durante dos décadas con la organización de los Dodgers y los ayudó a atraer a personalidades de las Grandes Ligas como Hideo Nomo, Takashi Saito, Hiroki Kuroda, Chan Ho Park y Hong-Chi Kuo. Su entrevista para Discover Nikkei fue realizada conjuntamente con la exhibición Dodgers—La Hermandad del Juego, que se presenta en el Museo Nacional Americano Japonés. (Setiembre del 2014)