Card Of The Week May 12

Last Friday night in Kyoto was the final evening of the Japan Women's Baseball League's "Victoria Series Spring League", which is basically a nine game tournament between the three primary teams of the league (Aichi Dione, Kyoto Flora and Saitama Astraia).  Friday night's game between Saitama and Kyoto (which was a home game for Saitama despite the game being played in Kyoto) went into extra innings tied at one.  In the bottom of the eighth (JWBL games only go seven innings), Saitama's Mari Yamazaki came up to bat with one out and Haruna Tadano at first and proceeded to do something that had never been done before in the 10+ year history of the JWBL:



Yamazaki hit the first ever Sayonara home run in the history of the league to win the game for Saitama 3-1.

Here are both of her cards from Epoch's JWBL sets:

2016 Epoch JWBL #39

2018 Epoch JWBL #25

Missing In Action - Hideo Nomo

When it comes to guys who've been left out of Japanese card sets, there's no one who's been left out more than Hideo Nomo.

After playing a couple seasons for Nippon Steel of the industrial leagues after graduating high school and playing on the 1988 Japanese Olympic Baseball Team, Nomo was selected by a record eight teams in the first round of the fall 1989 draft.  The Kintetsu Buffaloes won the lottery for his rights and he made his debut the following season.  And what a season it was - Nome went 18-8 with a 2.91 ERA and 287 strikeouts in 235 innings pitched.  He led the Pacific League in wins, strikeouts and ERA and became only the second NPB player ever to win the MVP, Rookie Of The Year and Sawamura Awards (and he was the only guy to win all three in one year).  He also was named to the Pacific League's Best 9 that year.  He followed that up with a three more seasons of leading the Pacific League in wins and strikeouts before having a so-so year in 1994, much of which was caused by his disagreements with the team and manager Keishi Suzuki.

Nomo's agent, Don Nomura, had found a loophole in the MLB and NPB agreement that would allow Nomo to become a free agent and sign with an MLB team so after the 1994 season he voluntarily retired from NPB and signed a deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers.  He sent 13-6 with an ERA of 2.54 ERA and a National League leading 236 strikeouts in his first season in MLB.  He won the NL Rookie Of The Year award, becoming the only player ever to win the award in both NPB and MLB.  He spent most of the following ten seasons in the majors, playing for Dodgers, Mets, Tigers, Red Sox and Devil Rays.  He threw two no-hitters, both the first and so far only ones thrown at two hitter friendly ballparks - Coors Field in Denver (for the Dodgers against the Rockies in 1996) and Oriole Park At Camden Yards in Baltimore (for the Red Sox against the Orioles in 2001).  After a couple of seasons in the minors he returned to the majors in 2008 with the Royals but was released after pitching poorly in three outings and retired a few months later.

Nomo won 201 games between MLB and NPB (123 in MLB, 78 in NPB) and struck out 3122 batters (1918 in MLB, 1204 in NPB).  The 200 wins earned him a spot in the Meikyukai and he was elected to the Japanese Hall Of Fame in 2014, his first year of eligibility.  He was only the third player ever elected to the Hall Of Fame on the first ballot (after Victor Starffin and Sadaharu Oh) and was the youngest player (at 45 years and four months) ever elected.

Nomo had many cards during his five seasons in Japan.  He only had one card in 1990 (in the Takara Buffaloes team set) but he had at least fifty in the following four seasons, mostly from BBM, Calbee, and Takara but also Q-Cards and Tomy.

1990 Takara Buffaloes #11

1991 BBM #379

1992 BBM #4

1993 Calbee #8

1994 BBM All Stars #A48

But after 1994 - absolutely nothing.  There are no NPB cards of Nomo after 1994.  In fact the only Japanese cards I know of for Nomo after he left for MLB are from the 2003 Topps/Kanebo set that depict Nomo as a Dodger.  He might be in some of the other MLB sets made for the Japanese market in the early 00's but I haven't been able to find a checklist to verify. 

Actually I need to add a caveat to that.  Like Warren Cromartie, Nomo had four cards in the 2000 BBM 20th Century Best 9 set but none of them show his picture:

2000 BBM 20th Century Best 9 #024

There's a fairly large number of BBM sets that could reasonably have been expected to include Nomo - the 2004 and 2010 Kintetsu Memorial sets (the 2004 one was for the team "merging" with Orix while the 2010 one was for the team's 60th Anniversary), the 2010 (BBM) 20th Anniversary set, the 2013 Osaka Limited set (he was born in Osaka), the 2014 80th Anniversary Pitchers Edition set, the 2014 All Star Game Memories 90's set, the 2014 Buffaloes Achievement set, the 2015 (BBM) 25th Anniversary set, the 2016 Spirit Of Legends box set (featuring Sawamura Award winners) as well as any number of the annual "Historic Collection" sets BBM did between 2002 and 2016.  He also would not have been out of place in any of Epoch's sets with the All Japan Baseball Foundation/Japan Baseball Promotion Association/OB Club or either of Calbee's Anniversary subsets for their 30th (2002) and 40th (2012) Anniversaries.  All of these opportunities and yet no Nomo appearances.

I have no idea why Nomo has not appeared on an NPB card since 1994.  It could be that the league still harbors resentment towards him for the way he left and has forbidden license holders to make cards of him.  It could be that Nomo himself harbors resentment towards the league and doesn't want to appear in any cards of theirs.  It could be some combination of both. 

2019 Panini USA Baseball Stars & Stripes "Rack Set" Japanese Collegiate All Stars

I did a post last month about the autograph/memorabilia cards for the 2018 Japanese Collegiate All Star team that Panini had included in their USA Baseball Stars & Stripes set.  A couple weeks later I started seeing non-memorabilia cards for the team on Ebay as well.  Apparently Panini sells a version of the set called a "Rack Set" - for $14.99 you get a complete 68 card base set "featuring the players on the 2018 USA Baseball Collegiate, 18U and 15U National Teams.  Each rack set also includes 2 autograph cards numbered to 100 from the 2018 national teams and 1 EXCLUSIVE 2018 Japanese Collegiate All-Star base card."  So the cards I've been seeing on Ebay are basically insert cards associated with the "Rack Set" sets.

As far as I can tell, all 24 players who had autograph/memorabilia cards in the original set have the non-memorabilia cards as well.  I've managed to pick up about half the set so far.  Here's some example cards:

#15

#4

#1

#22

The images of the players on these cards appear to be the same as the images on their autograph/memorabilia cards.  All of the player images are superimposed on the same infield background.

The backs of the cards are an improvement over the autograph/memorabilia cards in that there's a little bit of biographical information as well as a write up of the player's performance during the USA vs Japan All Star Series last July:

This is certainly a much more affordable way to put together a complete set of these players than trying to do it with the autograph cards.  I've seen two complete sets on Ebay - one for $80-ish and the other for $100 - but I've only spent around $30 on the 12 cards I've gotten so far.

Shohei Ohtani SCM Cards

With Shohei Ohtani returning to the Angels' lineup last night I thought I'd do a quick post listing the cards that he had that were included in Sports Card Magazine between 2013 and 2017 (when the magazine ceased publication).  Ohtani had six such cards which is more than most players although not the most - as far as I can tell Hideki Matsui had the most SCM cards with 8 while Hayato Sakamoto was second with 7.  I think Ohtani is tied for third with Ami Inamura.

Ohtani's first SCM card was in SCM #97 that was published in January of 2013.  The 2013 BBM Rookie Edition set included two cards of Ohtani that had a card number of 42 - one showing him "pitching" and one showing him "batting". This SCM card is a promo version of the "pitching" card.  I believe this is the first card ever issued for him as it came out a couple weeks before the set was published.  This is facsimile autograph parallel version of the card:

SCM #206

His second SCM card is the only one I don't actually own but David Saba shared an image of his card with me a few years back.  This card was in SCM #98 which came out in March of 2013 and is a promo version of his rookie card from the 2013 BBM 1st Version set (#183).  This is also the facsimile autograph version of the card:

SCM #208

His next SCM card is the only one that is an "original" card rather than a promo card.  2014 is the only year since 2009 that BBM didn't do some sort of "cross" set with their flagship sets or their team sets (or both).  Instead BBM issued a 36 card set through SCM called "Cosmic Cross".  Each issue of SCM in 2014 included 12 total insert card - six of which were "Cosmic Cross" cards.  Ohtani's card from this set was included in SCM #103 which came out in January of 2014:

SCM #225

The following issue (#104 that was published in March of 2014) contained promo cards for Ohtani's cards in the 2014 BBM 1st Version set.  As they did in the 2013 Rookie Edition set, BBM included two different cards with the same number (#137) in the 2014 1st Version set - one with him pitching and the other with him hitting.  SCM included a promo version of both cards:

SCM #242

SCM #243

After including five cards of Ohtani in the eight issues of the magazine (and 42 cards) between SCM #98 in January, 2013 and SCM #104 in March, 2014, it would be another two years before they included another card for him.  SCM #116, published in March of 2016, included a promo version of Ohtani's card (#04) from the 2016 edition of BBM's annual Icons box set.  The theme that year was "Speed":

SCM #365

This was the final SCM card for Ohtani as BBM would stop publishing the magazine after issue #121 in January, 2017.

Card Of The Week May 5

The Reiwa Era began last Wednesday and the first player to hit a home run in the new era was Hayato Sakamoto of the Giants, who hit a solo shot off Daisuke Yamai of the Dragons in the second inning of their game that day.  I kind of view Sakamoto as the NPB equivalent of Derek Jeter in that he plays the glamour position for the most storied team in the league (much as it pains me to admit) so of course Sakamoto was going to hit the first Reiwa home run.

I have an odd card of Sakamoto to share this week.  It's a promo card from Bandai for the 2011 Owners League 02 set.  Here's the front and back of it:

You can see that the card number is "OLP02 001/001" which I think means "Owners League Promo 02" although what's kind of odd about that is that the actual cards from the 02 set are labeled "OL06" as it was the sixth Owners League set issued by Bandai - they issued four in 2010 and this was the second one issued in 2011.  So why is this card labeled "02" while the others are labeled "06"?  I have no idea.

UPDATE 5/7/19 - I had no idea but Ryan did - the OLP02 means it was the second Owners League Promo card, not that it was a promo for the "02" set from 2011.  He thinks it might have been some sort of redemption thing with Tokyo Metro where you'd get some sort of card of pamphlet stamped at several different Metro stations and redeem it for the promo card.

NPB Down Under

The Shlabotnik Report started an interesting Blog Bat Around the other day - how many countries do you have baseball cards from?  I'm not really going to participate in it as my collection doesn't have a wide variety of countries represented - most of it's from Japan with a little bit from Korea and a little bit from the US (mostly WBC related).  But I thought I'd take the opportunity to talk about some cards I just picked up from another country - Australia.

The Australian Baseball League started back up in 2010 and NPB teams have sent players to play in the league every season.  There haven't been a lot of official cards issued for the league (although the Australian Custom Baseball Cards blog shows great homemade cards) and what I've seen doesn't include many of the NPB players - for example the 2018-19 Choice set only has one Japanese player who's no longer under contract with an NPB team.  But I was pleasantly surprised to find a handful of cards on Ebay recently that did feature NPB players on ABL teams.

The 2011-12 Brisbane Bandits featured five players from the Fukuoka Softbank Hawks (who had just won the 2011 Nippon Series) - Kenta Imamiya, Taisei Makihara, Keiji Nakahara, Ayatsugu Yamashita and Yohei Yanagawa.  Imamiya and Makihara are still with the Hawks while Yamashita (who goes by "Ayatsugu") is with the Eagles.  Nakahara and Yanagawa retired following the 2013 and 2012 seasons respectively.

In 2012 Brisbane issued a pair of team sets that were not related to the "official" cards issued for the ABL from a company called Select.  These appear to be team issued sets that were available as a giveaway.  The first set contained 30 cards and included player cards for Makihara, Yamashita and Yanagawa.  The second set had 31 cards and included player cards for Imamiya and Nakahara.  The second set also includes a subset for Brisbane players who were selected for the 2011 All Star Game - this subset includes Imamiya, Yamashita and Yanagawa (as well as future Orix Buffalo Alex Maestri) along with a group photo of the All Stars.  There's also a third Yamashita card in the "Non Stop Action" subset.

I have all the NPB player cards from these team sets except for the group All Star card and the "Non Stop Action" card of Yamashita.  Here's each of the cards along with a card of the player with the Hawks:

2012 Brisbane Bandits Team Set II #037

2012 Brisbane Bandits Team Set II #053

2014 Hawks "Special Baseball Card" #2

2012 Brisbane Bandits Team Set I #022

2019 BBM 1st Version #043

2012 Brisbane Bandits Team Set II #044

2012 BBM Hawks #H58

2012 Brisbane Bandits Team Set I #014

2012 Brisbane Bandits Team Set II #052

2014 BBM Hawks Futures And Legends #17

2012 Brisbane Bandits Team Set I #013

2012 Brisbane Bandits Team Set II #051

2011 Bandai Owners League 04 #010

The 2012-13 Canberra Cavalry won the ABL Championship.  The team featured three players on loan from the Hanshin Tigers - Masanori Fujihara, Kohei Shibata and Hirokazu Shiranita.  None of the three are still active players.  Fujihara retired after the 2015 season, Shibata retired after spending one season with the Marines in 2017 and Shiranita retired in 2016 after spending two seasons with Orix.

A card company called Dingo issued ABL cards for the 2013-14 season.  As part of those cards they issued a 43 card "Canberra Cavalry Championship Edition" set that celebrated Canberra's championship the previous season.  This appears to be the only one of Dingo's ABL sets that included any Japanese players as all three Tigers players are in the set.  Here are the three cards along with cards showing them with the Tigers:

2013 Dingo Canberra Cavalry Championship Edition #116

2015 BBM Tigers #T19

2013 Dingo Canberra Cavalry Championship Edition #091

2016 BBM Tigers #T56

2013 Dingo Canberra Cavalry Championship Edition #115

2008 BBM 1st Version #106

The only other Australian cards that I know of featuring NPB players (other than the two I mentioned from the Brisbane set) is a card for Tigers pitcher Takumi Akiyama from the 2012 Select set for the Canberra Cavalry and a couple cards of Kenshi Sugiya of the Fighters from what I think is a team issued set for the Brisbane Bandits from 2018.  I will need to keep an eye out for these cards as well as the 2012 Select card for Dae-Sung Koo when he was with the Sydney Blue Sox.

UPDATE - Steve Smith contacted me today to let me know that I had missed an NPB player.  The Melbourne Aces have had a number of players from the Saitama Seibu Lions play for them over the years but it looks like only one of them made a card set - Toshihiro Iwao appears in the 2013-14 Dingo set for the Aces.  I had missed this when looking through the Dingo checklists on the Australian Custom Baseball Cards blog.  Steve was kind enough to send a photo of the card:

So that's another card I will need to be on the look out for.

2018 Hanwha Eagles Calendar Cards

I got a package from Korea in the mail the other day courtesy of Dan that contained an 12 card set produced by the Hanwha Eagles in 2018.  Dan said that the set was sold with a calendar which is why he refers to it as the "Calendar Cards" set.  It was 12,000 won ($12) and was available on the Eagles on-line store (which is where Dan bought it from) although they appear to be sold out - maybe Dan got the last couple.  (I have to say that I'm amused that the title of one of the store's categories is being translated by Google simply as "Stuff".)

Anyway it's an attractive little set.  The cards are a little smaller than standard size and feature rounded corners.  They are also unnumbered.  I won't pretend that I know enough about Hanwha to be able to talk about the player selection - the only player I knew off hand in the set was former Chiba Lotte Marine Kim Tae-Kyun.  Here's the front and back of Kim's card:

There's a black border at the top of the card that my scanner cut off.  It makes it hard to tell that the top corners are rounded.

I had originally thought all the backs were identical but then I realized that the print in the lower left corner was biographical information for the player.

Here's a couple other example cards.  These scans also suffer from having the top border cut off:

Dan has the checklist of the set along with scans of all the cards up at TradingCardDB.com.

Thanks for picking the set up for me Dan!

5/3/2019 UPDATE - Dan sent me a little more information after I posted this.  The cards came in a little bag with the calendar.  Each page of the calendar had a slot to put a card but there wasn't any set order the cards were supposed to go in.  Here's a photo he sent me of the calendar when he got it:

He also sent me better scans of the cards that don't have the tops cut off: