Summer Sets

Time for another round up of recently announced sets:

- After being delayed to October last year, this year's edition of BBM's 2nd Version set will be released at its usual time in early August.  BBM has restored the set to the pattern it had from 2015 to 2019 where there are 216 "regular" player cards (18 per team), 36 "1st Version Update" cards (3 per team), 12 team checklist cards, 36 "Cross Torrent" cards (3 per team) and an unspecified number of "Ceremonial First Pitch" cards (in case you forget, last year's set only had 180 player cards but also had three 12 card subsets so the set was roughly the same size as usual).  I had wondered if the "1st Version Update" subset might be larger this year since there were so many foreign players who hadn't gotten into Japan in time to be included in the 1st Version set but apparently not.  There are four 12 card insert sets - "New Sensation", "Showman", "Phantom" and "Picturesque" - I'm pretty sure the last two of those are serially numbered.  There are memorabilia cards of Teruaki Satoh and Takahisa Hayakawa randomly included in packs.  There are also several varieties of autograph cards available including buy-back autographs for Tomoya Mori.

- Another one of BBM's annual sets that was delayed several months last years was the first of their cheerleader/dance squad sets called "Dancing Heroine - Hana".  This year's edition will be released in early August which is still about six weeks later than normal.  BBM doesn't list the exact number of cards in the set on their webpage but it's expected to be around 80.  Only eight of the eleven teams that have cheerleaders (the Carp do not) are represented in the set - the "Honeys" (Hawks), "M☆Splash!!" (Marines), "bluelegends" (Lions), "Tohoku Golden Angels" (Eagles), "FIGHTERS GIRL" (Fighters), "VENUS" (Giants), "Cheer Dragons 2021" (Dragons) and "Passion" (Swallows).  I don't know why the squads from the Tigers, Buffaloes and Baystars are not included.  There's a foil parallel version for each card in the set along with autographed cards.

- Another team is getting an OB set using BBM's new "History" format.  The "Dragons History 1936-2021" will apparently follow the style used last year for the Carp and Giants.  The set celebrates the Dragons' 85th Anniversary so it's the next set in the progression of the 70th, 75th and 80th Anniversary sets issued in 2006, 2011 and 2016 respectively.  Like the Carp and Giants sets, the base set will include 90 cards that are split between "team history" (6 cards), OB players (72 cards) and active players (12 cards).  There's three insert sets - a 12 card "Dream Team" set, a nine card "Team Records" set and 12 serially numbered "Phantom" cards - along with assorted autograph cards.  The set will be out in mid-August.

- Back in February I mentioned that the Eagles had issued a team set called "Eagles 1st Version" which implied that someday there would be an "Eagles 2nd Version" set released.  Well, "someday" was last Friday when the Eagles released their 2021 "2nd Version" set.  There are 76 cards in the base set which are all the players on either the Eagles 70 man roster or their ikusei squad.  Unlike the earlier set, this includes the team's new foreign players as well as Masahiro Tanaka.  Each card has two signature parallel versions - a silver one and a serially numbered (to 30) gold one.  There are 10 short printed "photo variation" parallels showing the player on the card eating the bento box meal with their name on it that is sold at the ballpark.  There are two insert sets - an 18 card "H18tory Maker" set featuring Masahiro Tanaka (the cards are essentially the same as the ones being sold with potato chips at the Eagles' ballpark this year) and a nine card "Stars Of Tohoku" set (which are die-cut and limited to only 45 cards each although I don't know if they are serially numbered).  Finally there are jersey and patch cards available for Masahiro Tanaka as well as autograph cards for 42 different players.  There are also two checklist cards that are not considered part of the base set.  Jambalaya has most of the cards for the set (other than the memorabilia, autograph and "Stars Of Tohoku" cards) up on their website.

- The first 2021 set from SCC for the KBO will be released next week on June 30th.  The set is called "Rainbow" and Dan Skrezyna has all the details for the set along with images of sample cards over at Korean Cardboard.  It's a bit of a confusing set as there doesn't appear to actually be a base set - all the cards are serially numbered parallels.  There's 199 players in the set (20 for each team except for Hanwha which only has 19).  There are autograph cards available for each player in the set - each autograph is serially numbered to 24.  Boxes retail for about $135 and are guaranteed to include an autograph card and a rookie card.