Herbert North

Herbert North (Buster)

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 5' 11"

• High School McKinley High School

• Born January 12, 1910 in Hawai'i

BR register page

Biographical Information

Herbert North won the first game in Japanese pro baseball annals.

North pitched for the Paramount Cubs, a team run by Paramount Film, in 1935. He was one of three Hawai'ians to sign with the Nagoya Golden Dolphins in the new Japanese Professional Baseball League for 1936 alongside Yoshio/Sam Takahashi and Harris McGalliard (AKA Bucky Harris). He relieved Kiyoshi Makino in the first inning (or after one inning?) of the First Japan Professional Baseball League game and got the historic win over Dai Tokyo, despite walking ten (allowing four runs) the rest of the way.

He was 2-5 with a 6.48 ERA in 12 games (10 starts), walking 57 in 58 1/3 IP. He was 4 for 27 with a triple, four runs and a RBI on offense. He tied Chujiro Endo for the JPBL loss lead, having only won once after his historic debut. He tied Saburo Asaoka for 9th in wins, was second in games pitched (one behind Akira Noguchi), tied Noguchi and Masao Kitai for the most starts, tied for fifth in complete games (3), 4th in IP (between Tadashi Wakabayashi and Kazuyoshi Matsura), 4th in hits allowed (65, between Kitai and Chitoji Maruo), allowed the most runs (52, 10 more than Wakabayashi), gave up the most earned runs (42, 12 more than Wakabayashi), walked the most (22 more than anyone else) and was 5th with 26 K (between Kitai and Kozo Naito). He then returned to Hawai'i to play for local teams.

Buster was on the first Hawai'ian national team, at the 1940 Amateur World Series (Hawai'i was still a territory, not a state). While he had played pro ball, he was not the only former pro on the team in an Amateur event - Pat Gleason and Johnny Kerr had both played in the US minors. It was a problem throughout the era; Mexico had to withdraw from the 1935 Central American and Caribbean Games due to Cuban protests over their pro players but similar protests in the same event three years later did not pan out.

He was born the same day as another Buster, Buster Haywood.