Yet More Epoch One Cards

Continuing my posts about the cards Ryan sent me...

Ryan got me another big batch of Epoch One cards both from 2018 and 2019.  Epoch One you'll recall is the NPB equivalent of Topps Now.  The cards are made available online for a limited time (3 days) and they only print up as many as are ordered.  Cards are 500 yen (a little less than $5) each including shipping.  If you miss getting them directly from Epoch they usually show up on Yahoo! Japan Auctions and card shops for resale.  Most of them end up being around 600 yen but occasionally there are cards that go for higher.

Most of the cards Ryan got for me he ordered directly from Epoch although there's a couple he got on the secondary market.  As usual a bunch of them I asked him to get so that I could fill in spaces on my uniform posts (if I ever get around to updating them):

2018 Epoch One #98

2018 Epoch One #203

2018 Epoch One #215

2019 Epoch One #496

2019 Epoch One #518 

2019 Epoch One #545

2019 Epoch One #591

Several of the other cards I asked him to get commemorate various milestones.  This card is for Tetsuto Yamada setting the record for most consecutive stolen bases with 33 (a record he eventually extended to 38):

2019 Epoch One #523

These cards commemorate the no-hitters thrown by Kodai Senga and Yutaka Ohno in September:

2019 Epoch One #596

2019 Epoch One #606

This card shows Kazuya Fukuura catching a line drive for the final out in his retirement game:

2019 Epoch One #672

Half the NPB games on September 4th ended on sayanora home runs.  They were hit by Tetsuto Yamada of the Swallows, Tatsuhiro Tamura of the Marines and Yoshitomo Tsutsugoh of the Baystars.  Yamada's blast (a grand slam) was the 200th of his career.  Epoch didn't do Epoch One cards for the Baystars so there was no card of Tsutsugoh (which was a pity because he had an epic bat flip on that home run) but there were cards for Yamada and Tamura:

2019 Epoch One #560

2019 Epoch One #568

Akira Neo of the Dragons - their top pick from the 2018 draft - made his ichi-gun debut in September:

2019 Epoch One #666

Oscar Colas, the Cuban player on the Hawks who defected back in January, had two Epoch One cards last year.  The first was when the Hawks promoted him to the 70 man roster from the ikusei squad.  The second was when he homered in his first at bat with the ichi-gun team:

2019 Epoch One #319

2019 Epoch One #505

Epoch did cards for all the 2019 draft picks by the Swallows and Dragons.  The cards were done after the teams did their introductory press conferences for the players in December.  Ryan got me all the cards (six for the Swallows and seven for the Dragons) but I'll just share the cards of the two number one picks:

2019 Epoch One #746

2019 Epoch One #752

Lastly on September 20th, Ernesto Mejia hit a two run walk off home run to lead the Lions to a 5-3, ten inning victory over the Eagles.  I fell in love with the photo on this card:

2019 Epoch One #631

I've generated checklists of all the 2018 and 2019 Epoch One cards with print runs (when I know them which isn't often).  I've added a page with them to the side bar of the blog.