Don Nomura NPB was no longer bound to their NPB team outside Japan and was free to sign overseas without violating the working agreement. After the 1994 season Nomura assisted star NPB pitcher Hideo Nomo in testing the loophole. After failing to reach a contract agreement with the Kintetsu Buffaloes, Nomo retired from NPB and signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 1995. In 1998 he represented Hideki Irabu, whose contract was sold by the Chiba Lotte Marines to the San Diego Padres. Irabu stated that he would only play for the New York Yankees, and refused to sign with the Padres.
Hideo Noda Hideo Noda Hideo Noda (July 15, 1908 - January 12, 1939), also known as Hideo Benjamin Noda and Benjamin Hideo Noda, was a Japanese-American modernist painter and muralist, member of the "Shinseisakka" () movement in Japan, student of Arnold Blanch, and uncle of Japanese printmaker Tetsuya Noda, as well as alleged communist spy recruited by Whittaker Chambers. Noda was born on July 15, 1908, in Agnew's Village, Santa Clara, California, as the second son of Eitaro Noda, who had emigrated from a small village in the Kumamoto Prefecture of Japan. He returned for some years to his home prefecture in