There's been some discussion about this by people who have much more insight than I do in a couple threads over at japanesebaseball.com - here and more recently here. While I would tend to defer to their arguments, I also remember at least one member of that community pooh-poohing a report in Baseball America in 2003 that Kenji Johjima was considering leaving Japan as a free agent following the 2005 season in this thread.
So who knows? Since I've been seeing cards show up on Ebay, I thought as a public service I'd make an attempt at listing some of Darvish's more prominent cards. Luckily, since he wasn't drafted until the fall of 2004 (when he was 18 - I'm not trying to suggest he was drafted late), there's not a lot of cards to talk about. His BBM rookie card is #116 in the 2005 BBM 1st Version set - I assume he has a card in the 2005 BBM Rookie Edition set but I don't have it. He's in both the 1st Version and 2nd Version sets in 2006 and 2007 as well as the 2008 1st Version set (well, we can assume he'll be in the 2008 2nd Version set when it comes out). He also has cards in the 2006 and 2007 BBM Nippon Series sets as well as the 2007 BBM All Stars set. I think his first Calbee card is in the 2006 set. (This is not a definitive list, but just some of the highlights.)
Here's some cards:
From top to bottom, that's 2005 BBM 1st Version #116, 2006 BBM Nippon Series #S02, 2007 BBM All Stars #A07, 2007 BBM 2nd Version #503 and 2008 BBM 1st Version #461.
7 comments:
I actually have Yu Darvish's 2005 BBM Touch the Game Cut off Piece Ball insert card #B07. It has a piece of a game used baseball. Any idea how many of this card were actually produced? I also have his regular 2005 BBM Touch the Game card as well.
Thanks,
Mick
Not sure. There's a serially numbered version in which there were only 20 of each card produced, but if your card doesn't have a serial number, it's not one of them.
FWIW, Gary Engel's Price Guide lists your card at $100.
Thank you very much for the information. I checked the card and it doesn't have a serial number.
Wow, I had no idea tha this game cut off piece ball card is listed for $100.00.
Mick
I'm not sure you could actually get that price for the card anywhere. Engel's price guide, like most baseball card price guides, always seems a bit high to me. I suspect some of that comes from him being the main Japanese card dealer in the US.
I appreciate your comments on this because I personally think the Beckett guides don't really reflect the prevailing prices either. I think the pricing is based more on the speculation that he will be coming to the states to play but I am not so sure.
Thanks again for looking into my request.
Mick
That card and Daisuke Matsuzaka's are the most expensive listings in that set, so yeah, it's based on that speculation. I'm not willing to pretend that I can predict whether or not he's going to come to the States, so I can't tell you if you'd be better off trying to sell it now (and assume he's not going to come) or wait (and assume he is going to come).
That's assuming that you were interested in selling it, of course. There are speculators out there buying his cards on eBay.
I will probably hold on to it. I am curious to see how much better he will be in Japan. I think he needs more seasoning before coming to the States. I do feel though that if his team is strapped, they may jump at an early posting but again, he needs to agree to do so.
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