Monday, June 27, 2016

Kosuke Fukudome

Kosuke Fukudome became the latest member of the Meikyukai last Saturday when he singled for his 2000th career hit (498 in MLB and 1502 in NPB) last Saturday against the Carp.  Fukudome was the first round pick of the Chunichi Dragons in the fall 1998 draft.  He had previously been drafted in the first round by the Buffaloes in the 1995 draft but choose not to sign and instead played in the industrial leagues for Nippon Life Insurance Company for three years.  He left the Dragons as a free agent following the 2007 season and headed for America, spending the next five seasons with the Cubs, Indians and White Sox.  He then returned to Japan, joining the Hanshin Tigers in time for the 2013 season.

He's played for the Japanese National Team in two Olympics (1996 as an amateur and 2004) and two World Baseball Classics (2006 and 2009).  He had a pinch hit two run home run in the seventh inning of a scoreless game against Korea in the semi-finals in 2006 that kicked off Japan's scoring on their way to a 6-0 victory.

I previously did a post for Fukudome when he left for America so I'll just share a handful of his cards now:

2000 Upper Deck Victory #31

2006 Upper Deck WBC Moments #CM-23

2007 BBM Dragons #D078

2013 BBM 1st Version #127

2015 Tigers Original Player Card #20
Here's a video of him getting his 2000th hit and the presentation afterwards (H/T NPB Reddit):

6 comments:

Unknown said...

Awesome. He's not gotten enough credit for his talent since moving to the majors but he's still playing at a very high level at age 39.

P-town Tom said...

He may not have given the Cubs what they hoped for when he signed, but he's still one of my favorites. Nice post and thanks for the update on him!

Russell said...

I hope you can answer a question I have? I was wondering if there are digital Japanese cards apps like Topps Bunt, Huddle, Kick, Star Wars and TWD/FTWD?

NPB Card Guy said...

Sorry but I'm not aware of any digital baseball cards in Japan. Which doesn't mean they don't exist - I just haven't heard of any.

Russell said...

Thank you.

Jason Presley said...

There is Pro Baseball PRIDE in Japan (プロ野球 PRIDE, https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=jp.colopl.baseball ) that is possibly similar. I see lots of listings for these virtual cards in my search results on Yahoo Auction Japan.