2019 NPB Draft

Today was draft day for NPB.  In the past I've always mislabelled the draft by using the following year in identifying it (for instance calling the draft that happened in October of 2015 the "2016 Draft") but since I haven't done a post for the draft in two years I figure it's time to correct this.  You can see the results (as always) over at Marinerds as well as this post over at NPB Reddit.

I didn't think I'd be doing another draft post since BBM hasn't done a collegiate card set in over six years now but luckily Panini put out a bunch of autograph/memorabilia cards (as well as what are basically some non-autograph/non-memorabilia insert cards) for the 2018 Japanese Collegiate All Star team with their USA Baseball Stars & Stripes set last spring.  A couple of those players were taken in today's draft:

Shoki Katsumata, Kokusai Budo University (Buffaloes #5)

#JCS-SK (Samurai Japan Patch)

Masato Morishita, Meiji University (Carp #1)

#JC-MM (All Star Signatures)

Toshiya Sato, Toyo University (Marines #2)

#12

Takashi Umino, Tokai Univ (Hawks #2)

#JCS-TU

Eight other players in the set were taken in last year's draft so with the addition of these four players half of the 24 players are now in NPB (assuming all four of these players sign).  I had been particularly interested in where Morishita got drafted as I saw him pitch last May.  I was a little disappointed that another Tokyo Big Six pitcher that I saw (Rikkio's Seiya Tanaka) did not declare for the draft.  Deanna Rubin told me that he's "got a job with Osaka Gas" (i.e. will be playing for Osaka Gas's industrial league team) for the next two years and will see how things go after that. She thinks he's concerned he's too short to be a professional pitcher.  Tanaka is also in the Panini set.

One other note about the draft - two members of last summer's Shikoku Island League All Star team that played in the Can-Am League were drafted - Junichiro Kishi was taken in the eighth round by Seibu while Hayato Hirama was taken in the first round of the ikusei draft.  Both had played for the Tokushima Indigo Socks (oh, wait, that's the 2019 Shikoku Island League Champion AND 2019 Grand Champion Tokushima Indigo Socks).  I don't know if there are any cards available for them.  There were two other players drafted from the SIL but neither of them played on the Can-Am League team last summer.

UPDATE - I missed one player from the Panini set.  Pitcher Yuki Tsumori from Tohoku Fukushi University was taken in the third round by the Hawks.