Tuesday, September 19, 2017

Takashi Toritani

Back on September 8th Takashi Toritani of the Tigers became the fourth Japanese player to reach 2000 hits this season.  Toritani was the Tigers fourth round draft pick out of Waseda University back in the fall 2003 draft.  He's been with the Tigers ever since, having taken over the starting shortstop position from Atsushi Fujimoto in 2005.  He's made the All Star team seven times (2005-06, 2012-15, 2017) and been named to the Best 9 team six times (2008, 2010, 2011, 2013-15).  He's also won four Golden Gloves (2011, 2013-15).  He has played in two Nippon Series (2005, 2014), both in losing efforts for the Tigers.  He's played for the Japan National team once for the 2013 World Baseball Classic.  He made an attempt to come to MLB following the 2014 season but while he did attracted some interest, he didn't get a deal that he was happy with and he stayed in Japan.

Here's a sampling of cards from though out his career:

2004 BBM 1st Version #213

2005 BBM Nippon Series #41

2007 BBM Tigers #T067

2010 Calbee #025

2011 BBM Legend Of Tokyo Big 6 #084

2012 BBM All Stars #A58

2015 Tigers Original Player Card #13

2017 BBM 2nd Version #546

The first card he ever appeared on was #40 in the 2004 BBM Rookie Edition set which I don't have.

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