Former Yankees pitcher Hiroki Kuroda to retire after Japan Series

TOKYO -- Former New York Yankees pitcher Hiroki Kuroda announced he will retire at the end of the Japan Series.

Kuroda, 41, went 10-8 this season, with a 3.09 ERA, to help the Hiroshima Carp to their seventh Central League title in Japanese professional baseball.

Kuroda turned down a lucrative contract with the Yankees in order to return in 2015to Hiroshima, where he spent his entire career -- from 1997 to 2007 -- with the Carp before his first season in Major League Baseball in 2008 with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The Carp last won the Japan Series championship in 1984. They face the Nippon Ham Fighters in the Japan Series starting on Saturday.