There was kind of an interesting story that came out a couple weeks ago - former MLB player Eric Anthony, who was raised by a single mother and never knew his father, discovered that his father was former Dodgers star Willie Davis. You can read all the details in the linked story but I just wanted to point out that both Davis and Anthony played in NPB. Davis played for the Dragons in 1977 and the Crown Lighter Lions in 1978, their final season in Fukuoka before being sold to Seibu and moving to Kanto. Twenty years later, Anthony spend part of the 1998 season with the Yakult Swallows.
Davis had a number of baseball cards in his two years in Japan. Engel lists 15 in all including several Calbees and two Yamakatsus. I only have two of his cards:
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| 1977 NST #14 |
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| 1978 Yamakatsu JY8 #8 |
Anthony, on the other hand, has no Japanese cards that I'm aware of. I did find a picture of him in a Swallows uniform in the 1999 edition of the late Wayne Graczyk's annual "Japan Pro Baseball Fan Handbook & Media Guide":
Happy Father's Day to all you fathers out there!
6 comments:
Anthony doesn’t have any Japanese cards. He’s not in the 1999 BBM set.
One of the things l like about BBM's card sets is that they tend to be update to date. Since Anthony didn't play in Japan in 1999, I wouldn't have expected him to have a card in the 1999 set. He didn't join the Swallows until July of 1998 so it was much too late for him to have been in the 1998 set - and they didn't add the Fusion set until 2016.
I should have mentioned that Wayne Graczyk's annual "Japan Pro Baseball Fan Handbook & Media Guide" always had a gallery of the gaijin players from all of NPB history. I was fortunate that the latest edition I have is from 1999 as Anthony would have appeared in any edition of it from 1999 on.
That's one of my favorite parts of those Japan Pro Baseball Handbooks. It's the only time I've seen a picture of Goose Gossage with the Hawks.
Yeah, those have been a great source for photos
Oh wow, that is an interesting back story there.
Its a shame Anthony doesn't have any Japanese cards, his name brings back fond memories. I remember buying my first ever Beckett in March of 1990 and being quite excited to discover that his 1990 Topps rookie card which I had just pulled from a pack was listed for $1.25.
I have a few of Willie Davis' Japanese cards, from the 1978 Yamakatsu set and also one of the bigger sized Yamakatsu sets (can't remember which one). I also have a Calbee card of his with the Dragons which is one of my favorites.
Pretty much none of the late signing foreign players had cards in the 1990's BBM sets. There's probably a post I could do sometime listing all the foreign players who don't show up in BBM flagships sets...
Doesn't the bigger Yamakatsu card use the same photo as the JY8 set? I think it's one of the postcard sized sets.
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