Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Kazuhito Tadano

I made a mistake in this post where I said that Makoto Suzuki was the only Japanese player to play in the States before he played in Japan. As Deanna Rubin pointed out, Kazuhito Tadano appeared in 15 games for the Indians in 2004 and 2005 before he ended up with the Fighters last year. Here's his 2008 BBM 2nd Version "Breaking Now" subset card (#746):


And I'm very amused at who the sponsor for Tadano's Baseball-Reference page is.

9 comments:

Fuji said...

hey npb card guy... this doesn't have to do with kazuhito tadano, but i was wondering if i could ask you a question. what's the most famous japanese baseball player (past or present) with the last name "fujimoto"? any help would be appreciated. i want to buy my dad a baseball card for father's day with the same last name. thanks in advance... keep up the cool blog.

Deanna said...

I sponsored almost every Fighters player I could! I also have Hillman and Shinjo and Seguignol and Sweeney and Glynn and Micheal Nakamura and...

which reminds me, wouldn't Micheal also qualify as played-in-MLB before Japan? He's half Australian, but he WAS born in Nara, which is why he was actually drafted when he came to play in Japan rather than signed as a foreign free agent.

NPB Card Guy said...

D'oh! again! I apparently have a blind spot for Fighters pitchers.

I did check that Masanori Murakami did pitch for Nankai before he pitched for San Francisco so at least I checked THAT Fighters pitcher...

Deanna said...

The... most famous player named Fujimoto? I mean, there's only one Fujimoto in the HoF here, but he's a Giants manager from a bazillion years ago. I think the best-known Fujimoto playing right now would be the guy on the Tigers, Atsushi Fujimoto.

NPB Card Guy said...

OK, there's Sadayoshi Fujimoto who, as Deanna said, managed the Giants a bazillion years ago (in 1935) and a bunch of other teams more recently, lastly the Tigers in the 1960's. There's also Hideo Fujimoto, who's listed in the Hall Of Fame as Hideo Nakagami. He pitched the first perfect game in NBP in 1950.

Fuji said...

Hey Deanna & NPB Card Guy,

Thanks a million. I really appreciate the help. I'll look for those people on eBay right away. Thanks again.

-Fuji

Anonymous said...

hello mr npb
i just want to ask how much to buy a set of calbee 1998 east special?
with a blue background , and which of these set is a hot card
and another one how much is a 1998 calbee exciting players compared to the regular one
thanks

NPB Card Guy said...

If you're interested in buying any cards, I would contact the sellers that I have listed in the links on the right side of the blog.

Anonymous said...

thanks mr npb