Tuesday, August 2, 2011

2011 Calbee Series 2 Box Break


After I was so happy with ordering the Fighters Future Icon set from Rakuten Global Market a few weeks ago, I decided to order a box of Calbee Series 2 from them.  The good news was that the box was about $22.  The bad news was that since the box contained 24 bags of potato chips (each with a pack of two cards attached), it weighed between 3 and 4 pounds, so EMS shipping (the only choice from Rakuten) to the US was over $40!  Yow!  I hadn't realized how bad it would be until I had already placed the order (it isn't entirely clear how much shipping is when you place your order).  I don't think I'll be doing that again.

On the plus side, however, I was very happy with the cards themselves.  I got an amazing 47 unique cards out of the 48 cards in the box.  I got 35 "regular" player cards (plus the double of Tadashi Settsu), 5 "Opening Game" cards, 6 "Star" cards (including a gold signature parallel card for Takahiro Iwamoto) and one checklist card.

The design of the cards is pretty much typical of Calbee over the last 15 years or so - full bleed, borderless fronts with the team name and logo and the player's name (first initial and last name) and number.  It's a design that I admire a lot, along with the photography.  Here's some sample cards:

Matt Murton (#124)

Michihiro Ogasawara (#129)

Yuta Naitoh Opening Game (OP-12)  Naitoh had a game winning
pinch hit in the bottom of the ninth in the opener on April 12 

Takahiro Iwamoto Gold Signature Star Card (#S-22)

Checklist (#C-7)

UPDATE:  Almost forgot - Jason had sent me a link to a store website that shows scans for all the cards in a bunch of this year's sets.  The Calbee Series 2 cards can be found here.

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