Nippon Professional Baseball players like the Lee brothers, Leron Lee and Leon Lee, Greg "Boomer" Wells, Randy Bass, and Ralph Bryant playing key roles on their NPB teams. In 1995, star pitcher Hideo Nomo "retired" from the Kintetsu Buffaloes and signed with the Los Angeles Dodgers. Nomo pitched over the span of 14 seasons in the Major Leagues before retiring in 2008. He won the Rookie of the Year Award in 1995. He twice led the league in strikeouts, and also threw two no-hitters (the only Japanese pitcher to throw a no-hitter in Major League Baseball until Hisashi Iwakuma achieved the feat in
Hideo Ohba aikido, his 6th dan in judo was awarded in 1950. During the 60's Hideo Ohba lead the effort for the creation of many of the koryu (old school) no kata forms from dai-ichi (first) to dai-roku (sixth) in order to work on techniques for demonstrations and other purposes (i.e. preservation, self-defense) other than randori. After his initial organization he presented his work to Kenji Tomiki who gave advice and corrections which was added to the kata. In 1978 he was awarded 9th dan by the Japan Aikido Association. He was also considered adept at kendo, naginata and iai. In February