Where Are They Now - 2008 Collegiate Players

There aren't many options for "pre-rookie" cards in Japan.  The NPB teams each have one minor league team, but there's no team sets available for the minor league squads.  Pretty much every player who ends up on an NPB team (either the ichi-gun or the ni-gun level) gets a card in BBM's Rookie Edition when drafted and usually in BBM's 1st Version set - either one of which should be considered the player's rookie card.  There do not appear to be any cards available for either the industrial leagues or the independent minor leagues.  There are no cards for high schools either and, up until 2008, there were no cards for collegiate players.

Actually let me revise that.  The first known Japanese baseball cards that depict specific players were for college players.  Most of these cards were issued in the early 1930's although there were a few in the late 1940's.  I'm pretty sure that there were no collegiate cards issued in Japan after the 1940's until 2008.

In 2008, BBM put out three collegiate sets.  Two were for the Tokyo Big Six league - a 60 card Spring Version set (featuring 54 players) and a 36 card Autumn Version set (containing 30 players).  The other set was a 44 card set (featuring 22 players) for the Collegiate National Team.  In addition to the BBM sets, there was actually sort of a Japanese collegiate set issued in the United States that year.  Upper Deck put out boxed sets for the amateur Team USA that year.  One of the possible inserts in the boxes were memorabilia cards for 22 players from the 2007 Japanese Collegiate National team.  There were a number of different versions of these cards available starting with simple jersey cards and moving into various serially numbered autograph, patch or jersey letter cards.

Now that five years have passed I thought it might be fun to see who from these four sets has moved on to bigger and better things.  (This should complement my draft posts where I list what sets players got drafted appear in - this will list what drafts players in a set were taken in.)  I will point out that this is not going to be a thorough "where are they now?" as I don't really know where anyone who didn't go to NPB ended up.  There may be players from these sets who are playing in the industrial leagues or in the independent minors but I don't know how I would be able to track that.  I've tried to get this as up to date as I can but I may have missed something.

Player	College	Drafted	Sets	Notes
Araki, Takahiro	Kinki	Swallows, 2010	CNT
Aranami, Sho	Tokai	Bay Stars, 2011	UD	Played for Toyota, Won Golden Glove in 2012 & 2013
Egarashi, Yuki	Meiji	Giants, 2012	AV	Played for Toshiba
Futagami, Kazuhito	Hosei	Tigers, 2010	SV
Hosoyamada, Takeshi	Waseda	Bay Stars, 2009	SV, AV, CNT, UD	Released by DeNA in October 2013
Inoue, Yusuke	Aoyama Gakuin	Eagles, 2009	CNT	Released by Rakuten in October 2013
Inui, Masahiro	Toyo	Fighters, 2011	CNT
Iwamoto, Takahiro	Asia	Carp, 2009	CNT, UD
Iwasaki, Kyohei	Tokai	Dragons, 2009	CNT
Iwata, Shinji	Meiji	Dragons, 2009	SV, AV, CNT
Kaida, Tomoyuki	Komazawa	Buffaloes, 2012	UD	Played for Nihon Semei
Katoh, Mikinori	Keio	Swallows, 2008	UD	Gave up Shinnosuke Abe's 200th home run on 9/18/2009, Retired at the end of 2012
Kokubo, Tetsuya	Aoyama Gakuin	Carp, 2008	UD
Komatsu, Takeshi	Hosei	Carp, 2009	SV, AV	Was with ikusei Carp for 2013 but was released at the end of the season.
Matsumoto, Keijiro	Waseda	Bay Stars, 2009	SV, AV, CNT, UD
Nakata, Ryoji	Asia	Dragons, 2010	CNT, UD
Nakazawa, Hiroki	Kokusai Budo	Giants, 2009	CNT, UD	Now with the Eagles
Nemoto, Tomohisa	Yokohama Shoka	Marines, 2009	UD	Now with the Fighters
Nomura, Yusuke	Meiji	Carp, 2012	AV	2012 Central League Rookie Of The Year, 2012 All Star
Ogino, Takashi	Kansai Gakuin	Marines, 2010	UD
Ohba, Shota	Toyo	Hawks, 2008	UD
Ohishi, Tatsuya	Waseda	Lions, 2011	AV
Ohno, Shota	Toyo	Fighters, 2009	CNT, UD
Saitoh, Yuki	Waseda	Fighters, 2011	AV, CNT, UD	2011 & 2012 All Star
Sakakibara, Ryo	Kansai Kokuin	Fighters, 2009	UD	2010 Pacific League Rookie Of The Year. Released by Nippon Ham at the end of the 2013 season and signed with Orix.
Shibata, Kohei	Kokusai Budo	Tigers, 2009	CNT
Suda, Kota	Waseda	Bay Stars, 2011	SV	Played for JFE Higashinihon
Takashima, Tsuyoshi	Aoyama Gakuin	Buffaloes, 2009	CNT	Released by Orix in November 2011.  Played 21 games with the Lancaster Barnstormers of the Atlantic League in 2013.
Takeuchi, Hisashi	Hosei	Carp, 2010	AV, CNT
Tatsumi, Shingo	Kinki	Hawks, 2009	CNT, UD
Tomura, Kenji	Rikkio	Eagles, 2010	SV
Tsuboi, Toshiki	Tsukuba	Marines, 2009	CNT	Released by Lotte October 2011
Uemoto, Hiroki	Waseda	Tigers, 2009	SV, AV, CNT, UD
Yamazaki, Noriharu	Yokohama Shogyo	Bay Stars, 2009	CNT UD

Legend - SV = 2008 BBM Tokyo Big Six Spring Version

               AV = 2008 BBM Tokyo Big Six Autumn Version

               CNT = 2008 BBM Japanese Collegiate National Team

               UD = 2008 Upper Deck Team USA 2007 Japanese Collegiate National Team Memorabilia Cards

Of the 54 players in the Tokyo Big Six Spring Version set, eight played in NPB.  Of the 30 players in the Autumn Version set, 10 played in NPB (including all five of the Waseda team members featured).  For the Japanese Collegiate National Team, 18 of the 22 members of the 2007 team featured by Upper Deck and 19 of the 22 members of the 2008 squad in the BBM set went on to play in NPB.