Thursday, March 12, 2015

Victory Cards

I've been aware for a while that there are a number of NPB teams that issue baseball cards for each victory during the season but until recently I didn't have any.  That's changed over the last month as I have picked up Victory cards for the Giants, Fighters and Lions.  I think that I've seen a post over at This Card Is Cool that had a Tigers Victory card but I can't find it now that I'm looking for it.  I don't know if any team other than these four have done these cards.

Each card shows a photo (presumably from the actual game) of a star of the game (whether the player was the formal "Star Of The Game" for the post-game interview, etc is an open question).  The back of the cards show a line score from the game and what I assume is a game summary (in Japanese obviously).

Here's a sample card from each set that I got cards from:

2009 "Giants Winning Game" Card

Back of 2009 "Giants Winning Game" Card

2010 "Giants Winning Game" Card

2010 "Giants Winning Game" Card

2011 Fighters Victory Card

Back of 2011 Fighters Victory Card

2012 "Lions Winning Game" Card

Back of 2012 "Lions Winning Game" Card

I was happy to get this one particular Lions card because I actually watched the end of that game.

I don't know a whole lot more about these other than what I have.  The Giants have a website where you can buy their cards (although I don't know if you can buy them from outside of Japan).  They also have an on-line gallery of their 2009-2011 cards.  I found that the Fighters still have a web page up about their 2010 set but I wasn't able to find anything else on their website about other years (although I could have easily missed it).  Ryan had found some "promo"(?) versions of the Lions cards at a flea market a while back.

From the webpages I mentioned, it looks like you can buy the Giants and the Fighters cards either by paying one price for a full season or buy them a month at a time.  I'm not sure if there are any other ways - although I think Ryan implied that it might be possible to get them in vending machines, presumably at the ballpark.

3 comments:

Ryan G said...

Since my post I've learned that the promo cards are most likely given away to fan club members, season ticket holders and probably attendees of early-season functions. There are baseball cards in vending machines at some ballparks, but I believe those are different.

I don't recall if I had a Tigers Victory card, specifically, though I have come across some commemorative cards for various teams over the past three years. I just got a postcard for a throwback day for the Lions (along with some fan club cards), and a Swallows card from 2013 for and most likely given away at Miyamoto's final game.

chouneal said...

Hi, You can see all Fighters Victory cards(2010-2012) at: https://www.flickr.com/photos/12269835@N07/albums

NPB Card Guy said...

Great stuff! Thanks for sharing.