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(Sports Network) - Hiroki Kuroda is set to make his major league debut tonight for the Los Angeles Dodgers, who send the Japanese import to the mound in the opener of a three-game weekend series with the San Diego Padres at Petco Park.

Kuroda signed a three-year contract with the Dodgers in December after a strong 11-year career with the Hiroshima Carp of the Japanese Central League. The 33-year-old posted a 103-89 overall record and a 3.69 earned run average during his tenure and was a three-time All-Star in his native land.

In 26 starts with the Carp in 2007, Kuroda amassed a 12-8 mark and a 3.56 ERA.

Kuroda will be facing a San Diego club that has won three of its first four games out of the chute, all coming at home against the Houston Astros. In Thursday's series finale, Tadahito Iguchi singled in Scott Hairston with the go-ahead run in the seventh inning as the Padres came through with a 3-2 victory over the Astros.

Hairston smacked a one-out triple off Houston's Oscar Villarreal in the seventh and crossed the plate on Iguchi's base hit up the middle. The single made a winner out of reliever Edgar Gonzalez, who allowed the Astros to tie the game with a run in the top of the seventh after replacing starter Randy Wolf.

Heath Bell preserved the San Diego lead with a scoreless eighth inning, while Trevor Hoffman rebounded from a blown save in Wednesday's 9-6 loss to Houston. The legendary closer tossed a perfect ninth to record his second save of the young season.

Hairston finished 3-for-3 with two runs scored, ending up a home run shy of the cycle. Kevin Kouzmanoff added a two-run homer for San Diego, while Wolf allowed just one run and four hits over the first six innings in his first start as a Padre.

San Diego will hand the ball to fifth starter Justin Germano in tonight's opener. The right-hander had an up-and-down 2007 campaign and finished the season with a 7-10 with a 4.46 ERA in 26 games (23 starts).

Germano posted a 4-0 record with a stellar 1.74 ERA over his first five starts after being called up from the minors last year, but was 3-10 with a 5.28 ERA over the remainder of the season. The 25-year-old also lost all three of his 2007 outings against the Dodgers.

In five career games versus Los Angeles, four of which have been starts, Germano is 0-4 with a 7.59 ERA in 21 1/3 innings.

The Dodgers started out the year with two straight wins over rival San Francisco, but the Giants averted a series sweep with a 2-1 triumph in Wednesday's series finale.

San Francisco's Randy Winn snapped a 1-1 deadlock with a bases-loaded sacrifice fly off Los Angeles' Esteban Loaiza in the sixth inning, and three Giant pitchers teamed to hold the Dodgers scoreless the rest of the way.

Hong Chi Kuo made an emergency start for Los Angeles as manager Joe Torre decided to hold out scheduled hurler Chad Billingsley due to a chance of bad weather. The Korean lefty tossed three scoreless innings before giving way to rookie Ramon Troncoso.

Billingsley did enter the game in the fifth and surrendered a run on two hits while recording just one out.

San Diego finished with a 10-8 edge on the Dodgers in last year's season series and won six of the nine matchups played at Petco Park. Los Angeles is just 6-12 in San Diego over the previous two seasons.