Boomer Wells

This week's installment of John Gibson's Japan Baseball Weekly podcast features an interview with Greg "Boomer" Wells, who played for a couple teams back in the Eighties and early Nineties.  I say "a couple teams" - it was really just two, but one of them changed their name twice while he was playing for them.  He signed with the Hankyu Braves in 1983 and was with the team when they were sold to Orix following the 1988 season.  The team was known as the Orix Braves in 1989 and 1990, then as the Orix Blue Wave in 1991, his last year with the team.  He spent the 1992 season playing for the Fukuoka Daiei Hawks before calling it a career.  He shows up pretty regularly in the recent OB sets, but I thought I'd show a couple cards from his playing days, one in each team's uniform:

1988 Takara Braves #44

1990 Calbee #98

1991 BBM #359

1992 BBM #364

(In case you were wondering, Mike Laga was #44 for the Hawks in 1991 and 1992 which is why Boomer couldn't get it when he joined Fukuoka.)

Just for grins, I thought I'd also show this:

1982 Topps #203

Two of the three guys on this card went on to play in Japan - Barfield played one season with Yomiuri in 1993, the year after Wells ended his career.