Japanese ace Yu Darvish pitched two scoreless innings with three strikeouts Wednesday in his first spring training start for the Texas Rangers in Peoria, Arizona. Darvish's first pitch as a Ranger was a fastball for a strike against the San Diego Padres' Cameron Maybin. Five pitches later, Darvish notched his first strikeout. "That feeling, that intensity is still not in midseason form, but I was happy to throw," Darvish said in an article posted on the team's website. Darvish allowed two hits, while he threw the first pitch for a strike to seven of the eight batters he faced. Twenty-six of his 36 pitches were for strikes. "I was not nervous at all," Darvish said. "Some of the players were teasing me about it before the game. I told them, 'No.' They said, 'You are! You are!'" The 25-year-old right-hander, who became a sensation for Japan's Nippon Ham Fighters, was obtained by the two-time defending American League champions after Texas spent the most money ever to obtain a Japanese prospect. The Rangers posted a winning bid of $51.7 million just for the right to talk with Darvish about a deal, that money going to the Fighters when Darvish signed a six-year deal with Texas worth $56 million plus incentives on January 18. Darvish was 93-38 with a 1.99 earned-run average over 164 starts over seven years in Japan, where he was twice named the league Most Valuable Player.