The Goddess Of First Pitch

I did a post a month or so ago on the history of BBM'a "Ceremonial First Pitch" cards and in it I mentioned that the person who has appeared the most number of times on these cards was Ami Inamura.  It's not even close - she's been on 14 different cards.  The three people tied for second have only been on 12 cards COMBINED - that's four each.  To be fair, I'm also counting the six cards she had that were given away in issues of Sports Card Magazine and I'm also counting the "secret version" (short printed photo variant) of her 2017 2nd Version card but even if you only count the cards that have come out of a pack and don't count the photo variant parallel, she still had seven cards, three more than anyone else.  

So who is Ami Inamura?  Her Wikipedia page says she's a "gravure idol, tarento, and sportscaster".  Other than her first pitch cards, I only know her from this:

She's the final batter in the commercial.

She apparently has set herself a goal of throwing out the first pitch at a home game for each of the twelve NPB teams.  I'm going to show all 14 of her "Ceremonial First Pitch" cards here (the cards are listed by card number, not the date of the first pitch ceremony):

2015 BBM 2nd Version #FP16/SCM #347 (Issued in SportsCard Magazine #113)

2016 BBM 2nd Version #FP05

2016 BBM Fusion #FP16

2016 BBM Fusion #FP23/SCM #386 (Issued in SportsCard Magazine #120)

2016 BBM Fusion #FP24/SCM #387 (Issued in SportsCard Magazine #120)

2016 BBM Fusion #FP25/SCM #388 (Issued in SportsCard Magazine #120)

2016 BBM Fusion #FP26/SCM #389 (Issued in SportsCard Magazine #120)

2016 BBM Fusion #FP27/SCM #390 (Issued in SportsCard Magazine #120)

2017 BBM 2nd Version #FP05

2017 BBM 2nd Version #FP05 (Secret Version)

2017 BBM Fusion #FP18

2018 BBM Fusion #FP22

2021 BBM 2nd Version #FP15

2023 BBM Fusion #FP48

If you looked at the ballparks listed on the cards, you might come to the conclusion that she HAS done all twelve teams but her first card is a little misleading.  She threw out the first pitch at the Tokyo Dome on July 28th, 2015 but it was for a game between Osaka Gas and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Hiroshima during the 86th Intercity Baseball Tournament, one of the top tournaments for corporate league teams.  She may have done all twelve teams - I don't know that there's a card for every time she's thrown out a first pitch - but if she's done the Giants, it wasn't immortalized on a card.

Inamura has also thrown out the first pitch at games from the Japan Women's Baseball League (JWBL) and she appeared in both of Epoch's sets for the league:

2016 Epoch JWBL #78

2018 Epoch JWBL #86

The back of the 2016 card says she threw out the first pitch at a Saitama Astraia vs Hyogo Dione game in Kawaguchi on April 9th, 2016 but the 2018 card does not identify the game.

She's had a handful of other cards.  I don't have any of these but I've swiped images of them from various places on the internet.  First up was this oddball Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters set issued by "Family Stadium" potato chips in 2017.  The cards depicted the players looking like 8 bit video game graphics characters.  Inamura appeared on a card in the set as well:

She appeared on this card given away with the April 4th, 2018 issue of Weekly Spirits magazine:

Later in 2018 she appeared on an Epoch One card commemorating her throwing a pitch 136 kph at some sort of event celebrating Epoch's 60th Anniversary:

She's had autographed cards available in both the BBM and Epoch sets she's appeared in.