Recently Announced New Stuff

Just doing a quick post to get caught up on what's been announced lately in the way of new releases{

- BBM has announced two more of this year's pack based team sets.  The Swallows set might be out as soon as I post this - it's supposed to hit the stores on June 24.   The Hawks set will be out in mid-July.  Both sets will have 81 cards in their base sets - like all the other team sets there's 70-ish cards for the manager and players on the team and 10-ish cards in a couple subsets.  Both sets have 18 insert cards and the usual assortment of autograph cards.

- The fourth edition of BBM's Classic set is due out in early July (Jambalaya has it on the 8th).  Classic is essentially BBM's version of Topps' Heritage and Archives sets.  Like the previous editions, there are 108 cards in the base set.  72 of these are for current players (6 per team) and will use the design of the 1994 BBM set.  The other 36 cards are for OB players (3 per team) and will use the design of the 2002 BBM All Time Heroes set.  Two of the three insert sets use older designs as well - there's a 24 card "All Around Players" set that reprises a design from the 1995 BBM set and a 12 card "3D Magic" set that looks like the 1996 "Magic Motion" insert set - the cards use a "SportsFlic"-like lenticular design.  The other insert set features 12 reprints of BBM rookie cards of active players.  There will be memorabilia cards (using a design from the 2003 Fighters team set) and autograph cards - including "buy back" cards that BBM bought on the card market and had players autograph.

- The second of BBM's annual sets dedicated to the cheerleaders and dance teams for various teams - Dancing Heroine Mai  - will be released in late July (Jambalaya says it will be the 22nd).   This is a pack based set featuring at least 87 cards in the base set - there will probably be more but it looks like the cards for the Buffaloes and Baystars cheerleaders are not set yet.  Each of the base set cards has a "holo" parallel and there are autograph cards and "cheki" cards available.

- Epoch has announced yet another high priced set.  This one is called "Pacific League" and features active players from the six Pacific League teams (naturally).  The base set has 54 cards (nine per team) but as you'd expect from one of these crazy Epoch sets, there's a myriad of possible parallel cards as well as various autograph and memorabilia cards available.  The set is being sold in boxes of six cards with a MSRP of 16,200 yen (roughly $155).  The six cards include three base set cards, one parallel card, one shadowbox card and one "special" insert card (which I assume is either an autograph or a memorabilia card).  The set will be out in mid-July.