2025 Takayuki Kishi Epoch One Card

I don't usually post about cards that I don't actually own but I saw this Epoch One card for Takayuki Kishi that I liked so much, I had to write about it.  Especially since I'm not going to actually get it.

Last week, Kishi started a game against the Hawks in Hirosaki in Aomori prefecture, up at the northern tip of the island of Honshu.  It was the 400th start of his career and, with the Eagles winning the game 10-3, he picked up his 170th victory.  In commemoration of this achievement, Epoch One issued this card:

I just thought this was a stunning photo, showing Kishi pitching in Hirosaki City Sports Park Baseball Stadium with the fans on the outfield berm behind him and the slope of Mount Iwaki in the distance.  That's Luke Voit, the 2020 MLB home run champ, playing first base behind Kishi.

The card went on sale on Thursday and was available until yesterday.  If you want one, you'll have to look for it on the secondary market now.

Card Of The Week August 31

I have two things I want to mention this week, one being something I should have noticed a few weeks back.

First of all, Munetaka Murakami of the Swallows has been on a tear lately.  He missed most of the first few months of the season recovering from injuries and didn't make it back up to the top team until late July.  He's been making up for lost time though, having hit 14 home runs in 30-ish games since his return.  His three home run game yesterday put him into a three way tie for sixth place in the Central League home run leader board, despite him having played less than a third of the games that the others have played.  Here's a card of Murakami from last year's BBM Swallows team set (#S79) - I believe he has followed the instructions on the card:

I actually didn't know about this next story until I noticed it on NPB's website when I was looking up the CL home run leaders.  NPB holds something called the "Fresh All Star" game each year a few days before the top team All Star series.  It pits All Star teams from each of the two farm leagues - the Eastern and Western - against each other, although I think that sometimes teams will dispatch young players who've been on the top team to play in the game.  So it's kind of a combination of a minor league All Star game with the MLB Futures game.  What I found interesting is that the MVP of this years game was Taisei Chinen, a member of the Oisix Niigata Albirex BC team.  The reason I find this interesting is that Niigata is not affliated with an NPB team - it's one of the two independent teams that NPB added to their farm leagues last year to give each league an even number of teams.  Chinen hit a two run home run in the top of the first inning of the game which gave the Eastern League their margin of victory - they ended up winning the game 3-1.  Now, obviously one game is a small sample size so you shouldn't read too much into a guy from an independent team winning a game MVP award instead of guys who are actually on NPB rosters but Chinen did lead the Eastern League in batting last year with a .323 average so it's not the first time he's outperformed NPB's farmhands (in fairness, since he couldn't get called up last year, he was able to accumulate enough at bats to qualify for the title while his rivals for it couldn't).  He apparently drew some interest from NPB teams last year but he didn't get drafted.  I'll be curious to see if that changes this year.  

Before signing with Niigata last year, Chinen had spent five years in the corporate leagues with Okinawa Electric and was featured in JABA's sets in at least 2021 and 2022.  I got his 2022 card (#22JP079) from Ryan last month:

2024 Bandai Pro Baseball Deforme Card Collection

Last year, Bandai teamed up with Namco to release a 36 card set featuring caricatures of players.  The set was called something along the lines of "Pro Baseball Deforme Card Collection".  "Deforme" refers to an art style of a figure having a big head and small body (H/T Nippon Baseball Retro) and you'll see in a minute that that's a very apt description of the artwork on these cards.  The cards were given away with bags of something called kaki no tane which is a bar snack consisting of soy crackers and peanuts (although the bags don't have peanuts).  

Generally I'm not a big fan of art cards or cards that feature artwork rather than photographs.  I was somewhat surprised that I liked the look of these when they were initially published in July last year and thought about picking up the complete set.  The prices were pretty high though so I settled for asking Ryan to just pick up a couple singles for me.  Sometime over the winter, however, I came across a complete set on Yahoo! Japan Auctions selling for around 3000 yen and asked Ryan to get it for me.  It was yet another item in the box I got from him last month.

If you've been paying any attention at all to NPB sets, you'll have already guessed that the 36 card set is split evenly among the twelve NPB teams with each team having three players in the set.  There's a further breakdown of the cards, though, as each team has an "Ultra Rare" card, a "Rare" card and a "Normal" card.  Here's a sample card of each type:

#BDC01-H01 (Ultra Rare)

#BDC01-O02 (Rare)

#BDC01-E03 (Normal)

You'll notice that the cards are numbered by team, with each number being "#BDC01-X##" where X is a one letter prefix to identify the team and ## is either 01, 02 or 03.  It turns out that all the cards with an 01 number are "Ultra Rare", all the cards with an 02 number are "Rare" and all the 03 cards are "Normal".

The cards themselves are 2 3/8 inches by 3 3/8 inches in size, a little smaller than the standard card size.  They're made of plastic instead of cardboard so they have kind of an odd feel.  They also have rounded corners which don't really come across in my scans.

The set contains many big stars from NPB in 2024, including Yuki Yanagita, Tetsuto Yamada, Kazuma Okamoto, Shugo Make, Tomoyuki Sugano, Hiroya Miyagi and Chusei Mannami along with veterans Tsuyoshi Wada and Masahiro Tanaka.  I did think it was kind of odd that the set didn't include two of the biggest names in NPB, though, as neither Munetaka Murakami nor Roki Sasaki are in the set.  Murakami is in the 2025 edition (more about that in a minute) but Sasaki, obviously because he's no longer in NPB, is not.

Here's a bunch more example cards - all either "Super Rare" or "Rare":

#BDC01-L02

#BDC01-C02

#BDC01-D02

#BDC01-F01

#BDC01-Y01

#BDC01-T01

#BDC01-B01

Bandai and Namco released the 2025 version of this set back at the end of March, just in time for the beginning of the baseball season.  One of the unexpected things that Ryan included in the box was 12 cards from it, a third of the set.  The new set is pretty much identical in design as the original one - same three card designs, same numbering scheme (except the card numbers start with "BDC2"), same card size, same set size - but, naturally, with a different roster of players.  The one big change with the 2025 set is that there are "facsimile signature" parallel versions of the "Ultra Rare" cards (which I guess would make them "Super Ultra Rare"?)

This year's set includes the afore-mentioned Murakami along with Kensuke Kondoh, Takeya Nakamura, Tomoya Mori, Hayato Sakamoto and Shosei Togo.  It also includes some foreign players which the 2024 set did not - Gregory Polanco, Domingo Santana and Livan Moinelo.  I think the biggest name who has not yet had a card in one of these sets is Teruaki Sato of the Tigers.  Here's a couple of the 2025 cards (one "Ultra Rare" and two "Normal"):

#BDC02-F01

#BDC02-D03

#BDC02-T03

I should mention that the card backs all use the same design, regardless of whether the card is "Ultra Rare", "Rare" or "Normal" or which set the card is from.  Here's an example back from each sets:

#BDC01-M02

#BDC02-G02

I really like these cards - they're just a lot of fun.  I probably won't break my vow of not getting any new sets to try to complete the 2025 set but I might try to at least get the Nakamura and Sakamoto cards from it.  You can see all the cards from both the 2024 and 2025 sets over at Jambalaya.

Ryan also sent me a couple unopened packs from the 2024 set:

Ryan also made good on his promise (threat?) to send me an unopened bag of kaki no tane.  Opinions seem to be divided some on the quality of this snack with Sean not being a fan (although he's softened his stance some) and others like Kenny and Fuji being fans.  I had never tried it so Ryan sending me an unopened bag (albeit one from last year that had passed it's "freshness" date on the package) was an opportunity to see what the fuss was about.  

My wife was game for trying it as well, so we opened up the bag and poured its contents into a bowl so that we could share it:

Since it's a common bar snack, we each opened a can of a Pale Ale from Sierra Nevada to have the full effect.  Our verdict...meh.  It wasn't bad so I don't think I agree with the hate but I don't feel any need to get any more of it either.  I will say the taste was somewhat familiar but I haven't been able to place it.  My wife and I both agreed that the traditional version of it with peanuts would probably have been better.  Maybe the next time I go to Japan, I'll try to hit a bar and try it there.

2024 Epoch One cards

As usual, I asked Ryan to pick up a bunch of Epoch One cards for me last year.  In fact, knowing that I was not going to buy any more cards after last season, I probably went a little overboard on what I asked him to get for me.  I had gotten ten of the 2024 cards from him last May when I met up with him in Tokyo and the rest (44 more!) were in the box I got from him about a month ago.

I should mention here that Epoch One is Epoch's version of on demand cards a la Topps Now although they are cheaper (500 yen) and are available for three days.  For whatever reason, they only do cards for ten of the twelve NPB teams, leaving out Orix and Hiroshima (although they've done the Carp in the past and do the Epoch One Signature Sets for them every November).

I usually have a couple possible reasons that I pick up a particular Epoch One card.  It may commemorate an interesting event, feature a player wearing an alternate uniform or just be a photo that I really like.  I've grouped the cards I got from Ryan in different categories for this post, just because I think it'd be a little more interesting than just listing 44 cards one after another.

The first group of cards are for games that I attended on my trip last year.  Ryan and I attended a game between the Lions and Eagles out at Seibu Dome on the first full day of my trip and Epoch did two cards from the game - one for Reon Murata getting a hit in his first ichi-gun at bat and one for Natsuki Takeuchi getting his third straight win without a loss (the first rookie Lions starting pitcher in 43 years to do so):

#396

#397

Four days later, I was in Nagoya for a matchup between the Dragons and Tigers that the Tigers won 1-0 in 11 innings.  Epoch again issued two cards for the game - one for each team.  The Tigers card commemorated Koji Chikamoto getting the game winning hit in the 11th inning while the Dragons card commemorated Mikiya Tanaka getting his first ever stolen base:

#399

#404

It would be another week before I attended another game that Epoch did cards for - the 21-0 shellacking that the Hawks administered to the Eagles on May 21st in Fukuoka.  Once again, Epoch did two cards - one for Kenta Imamiya hitting two triples in one inning and the other for Ryoya Kurihara getting four hits (including two home runs) and six RBIs:

#445

#446

The next night, I was back in Tokyo, watching the Dragons beat the Giants at Tokyo Dome.  Despite the loss, Epoch did a card for Yomiuri shortstop Hayato Sakamoto, who got his 450th double in the game:

#425

Fun fact - the only other guy in NPB history to reach 450 doubles was also at the game that night - Dragons manager Kazuyoshi Tatsunami.

The last game I was at that Epoch issued an Epoch One card for was two days later.  On Friday night, I was at the Marines-Hawks game in Chiba and saw Roki Sasaki get his fourth win of the season:

#437

This next batch of cards commemorated specific events that appealed to me.  This first one was for Yoshitomo Tsutsugoh's first game back in NPB since 2019:

#333

Shosei Togo threw a no-hitter against the Tigers at Koshien:

#442

On June 26th, the Lions and Fighters were tied 2-2 in the bottom of the 12th in Omiya.  With two outs and runners on first and second, Seiya Matsubara, attempting to be the hero of his first game with the Lions after being traded by the Giants, hit what looked like a game winning hit over the (as usual) drawn in outfield.  But Ryota Isobata ran the ball down, making a fantastic over the shoulder catch while falling down at the warning track to end the game:

#624

Two days later, Carter Stewart struck out 13 Fighters in 7 innings in Hokkaido with his parents in attendance:

#633

I'm always a sucker for cards showing pitchers batting so here's a couple:

#459

#843

I'm kind of amused that Togo's card mentions that he got his first hit of the season in the game that he threw his second shutout of the year.  His first shutout, of course, was the no-hitter.

This next batch of cards all feature alternate uniforms:

#523

#630

#649

#681

#734

#779

#796

#808

#822

#841

#848

919

#920

#934

You'll notice that some uniforms show up more than once.  That's mostly because I forgot what I'd already asked Ryan to get.

These cards commemorate walk off wins:

#353

#363

These cards just feature photos that I liked (although the Takeya Nakamura card also celebrates a rare stolen base by the slugger):

#325

#620

#1033

I got these next two cards because I wasn't sure either plsyer would be in BBM issues.  It turned out that I needn't have worried - Keuchel was in Fusion and Downs was in the Hawks - Fly Again box set.  The one I should have been concerned about was Mike Ford of the Baystars who did not have a BBM base set card:

#861

#1098

I'm going to be honest, I'm not entirely sure why I asked Ryan to pick up these next two cards.  I think the big reason was simply that I wanted to make sure I got at least one card of an Eagles player:

#849

#1115

I'm not sure if I've picked up any Epoch One cards for the All Star games previously but there were a couple I couldn't resist last year.  The Fighters hosted the first game as part of the 50th anniversary of Nippon-Ham buying the team before the 1974 season and they had their representatives at the game wear a variety of the team's uniforms from over the years:

#753

Bizarrely, pitcher Sachiya Yamasaki actually batted in the game, so I had to get the card that commemorated that, especially since he was wearing the harlequin alternate uniform from 2023:

#752

The second game was played the next day at Jingu Stadium in Tokyo.  Kensuke Kondoh won the pregame home run hitting contest:

#784

This last card from the All Star games is for Ryuki Watarai getting his first All Star hit and RBI with his father (former Swallow Hirofumi Watari) in attendance.  Not really sure why I asked Ryan to get it - probably just because I wanted a card from the game:

#759

The last batch of cards were from the post season.  There's one from each league's Climax Series and one from the Nippon Series.  The Sasaki card commemorates his last game in NPB before leaving for MLB:

#1132

#1135

#1184

There's one more card I want to share but this isn't one of the "professional baseball" Epoch One cards.  It instead is one of their "Event" Epoch One cards.  It looks like there's a bunch of cards issued for kickboxer Tenshin Nasukawa but the one I got was for "Shigeo Nagashima Day" last May.  It shows Nagashima with Hideki Matsui and Giants manager Shinnosuke Abe:

2024 Epoch One Events #014

At 377, the Fighters All Star card had the biggest print run of any of these cards (with the exception of the Nagashima card which was 450 but, as I said, not a "professional baseball" Epoch One card).  The lowest was the Ryoya Kurihara card with only 17.  The three Sasaki cards were all in the upper 200's.  Most of the rest of the cards had print runs less than 100.