2014 Calbee Series Three

The last of the sets I got from Hiro a few weeks back was this year's Series Three from Calbee.  Like the previous two Series, there was 100 cards in the set - 84 player cards (7 per team), a 12 card "Clutch Hitter" subset/non-premium insert set (1 per team) and four checklist cards.

The thing that hits you about all Calbee sets is the photography and this one is no exception.  If anything, the photography in this set exceeds expectations.  Lots of interesting action shots and candids:

#204

#189

#191

#228

#211

#219

#215

There's a bunch of cards showing players wearing some of the "special" uniforms from this season:

#202

#173

#190

#218

#179

One minor disappointment with the set is that there's only one card that uses a horizontal format.

#209

Nearly half (37) of the 84 players depicted in the set appeared in either the first or second Calbee Series this year as well.  In fact, there's five players who appear in all three of this year's Series - Hayato Sakamoto, Sho Aranami, Yoshio Itoi, Kenta Maeda and Takeshi Toritani,  If there was one thing that I'd like Calbee to change, it would be that I'd like less repetition of the players.

The "Clutch Hitters" subset is kind of uninspiring - all twelve players are depicted batting (as you might expect).  This is the only Calbee card for four of the players this year - Ryota Arai, John Bowker, Itaru Hashimoto and Anderson Hernandez.

#CL-11

The photos on the four checklist cards highlight some events in games from the first half of the season - Tiger pitcher Shintaro Fujinami homering against the Carp on April 15; Takahiro Suzuki of the Giants in a game the Giants beat the Fighters on May 26, the Eagles celebrating on the field after scoring four runs in the bottom of the ninth to beat the Tigers on June 3 and Takayuki Kishi celebrating his no-hitter against the Marines on May 2:

#CL-10

As always, all the cards can be seen at Jambalaya.