The long lance torpedoes were good but by that time of the war the US torpedo was equally as lethal. Since the American destroyers outnumbered the Japs 2 to 1 I think they could have given the Nip destroyers hell. Also take in account that Kurita had lost several ships of his task force to submarine attack and air attacks. Many of his ships were also damaged by air attacks and were not 100%. Since the USA enjoyed air superiority, Halsey's ships had not endured that kind of attack. It would have been a turkey shoot because Halsey's ships were all nearly new and state of the art. He also would the benefit of his carriers raining death from above. It would be near impossible for the Japs to survive a combined surface air attack of that magnitude.
All i remember is the horror stories about bad gyros and bad warheads.