Raidel Martinez

On Thursday of this week, Raidel Martinez of the Yomiuri Giants became the second pitcher this season to reach the 250 career saves mark.  Martinez did it in 411 career games, the fastest in NPB history - in contrast, Naoya Masuda, the last guy to reach the milestone, did it in 795 games, the most in history.  (In fairness to Masuda, there's only four other guys with more than 250 saves in NPB).  The Cuban Martinez has become only the third foreign player to meet the qualifications for the Meikyukai (2000 hits, 200 wins or 250 saves*).  The others are Alphonso Soriano and Alex Ramirez although Soriano has never been invited to join as he only had two hits in NPB (where he began his career with the Hiroshima Toyo Carp).

* Stats posted in MLB count as well but the first hits, wins or saves must be in NPB.  Ramirez's first hits were in MLB but he had 2000 hits in NPB as well.

Martinez was originally signed by the Chunichi Dragons as a development player (ikusei) in 2017.  He was registered to the 70 man roster in early 2018 and made a few appearances with the top team as a starter before shifting to the bullpen.  He replaced Hiroshi Suzuki as the team's closer at the end of May of 2019 and notched his first save on June 11.  He led the Central League in saves in both 2022 and 2024 before leaving the Dragons as a free agent at the end of the 2024 season.  He signed with the Giants and again led the Central League in saves in 2025 (and he's currently leading the league again this season).

Martinez was the first former development player to ever lead the league in saves and is the first one to make the Meikyukai.

He's played for the Cuban National Team in three World Baseball Classics (2017, 2023 and 2026) and two Premier 12s (2019 and 2024).  I'm kind of disappointed that he has not yet appeared on a WBC baseball card.

Speaking of his baseball cards, I believe that his earliest card is 2018's Epoch One #190 which commemorates his first career win on May 15th.  He also appeared in both BBM's and Epoch's comprehensive team sets that year (#D32 in BBM's set and #33 in Epoch's).  His first flagship set appearances for BBM, Epoch, Calbee and Topps were in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 respectively.  Here's some of his cards:

2018 Epoch One #190

2018 BBM Dragons #D32

2019 BBM Dragons #D32

2020 BBM 2nd Version #368

2021 BBM Dragons #D33

2022 Calbee Series Three #174

2023 BBM Fusion #GR23

2024 Epoch NPB #151

2025 BBM 35th Anniversary/Shukan Baseball 4000th Issue #121

Naoya Masuda

I'm a little late getting to this since I was out of town for a bit but on August 4th, Naoya Masuda of the Chiba Lotte Marines became the latest member of the Meikyukai or "Golden Players Club" when he notched his 250th save.  Masuda was reported in the press as the "first reliever born in the Heisei Era to make the Meikyukai" which is kind of silly as he's only the second Heisei-born member of the club (after Hideto Asamura).  He's likely to be joined soon by Raidel Martinez (243 saves) and Yasuaki Yamasaki (246 saves). 

Masuda was the Marines' fourth (and last) pick in the 2011 draft out of Kansai International University.  He was an integral part of Lotte's bullpen in 2012, making 72 appearances with a 2-2 record, 41 holds, 1 save and a 1.67 ERA.  He set records for most appearances and most holds in a season by a rookie and was selected as the Pacific League Rookie Of The Year.  He became the team's closer in 2013 and led the PL in saves with 33 but injuries and ineffectiveness caused him to lose and gain the closer role several times over the next few seasons.  It won't be until 2019 that he regained the role for "good" (or at least until last year) and he put up six straight seasons of at least 25 saves, including a league leading 38 in 2021.  He was only seven away from 250 saves before last season but injuries and ineffectiveness again caused him to lose the closing role and he ended the season with only 248 saves.  He worked hard this past off season to get back into shape but Rikuto Yokoyama was pitching well as the closer and save opportunities for the now setup man were hard to come by.  He got save #249 on June 10th but it would take another six weeks or so to get #250.  (H/T Thomas Love Seagull for the details about the past two seasons)

It took Masuda 795 appearances to reach 250 saves, the most of any pitcher in history.  He's also the only one to do it without having at least one start.  He's been a five time All Star (2012-13, 2016, 2021-22).  I'm a bit surprised that the only time he's suited up for Samurai Japan was for the squad that played against Taiwan in November of 2013 (which actually was the first time the National Team was called "Samurai Japan").

Masuda's first baseball card was #045 from the 2012 BBM Rookie Edition set.  He had additional rookie cards in BBM's 1st Version (#162), 2nd Version (#540), Marines (#M32), All Star (#A16) and Genesis (#CB053 from the Cross Blaze subset) sets as well as Calbee's Series Three (#179), Bandai's Owners League 03 (#064) and Konami's Baseball Heroes Black (#B12RB129) sets.  Here's a handful of his cards from over the years - I'll confess that it was somewhat difficult to find cards with interesting photos of him:

2012 BBM Rookie Edition #045

2012 BBM 1st Version #162

2012 Calbee Series Three #179

2013 BBM 1st Version #328

2016 BBM Marines #M29

2018 Epoch NPB #194

2018 BBM 2nd Version #352

2021 Calbee Series One #012

2021 BBM Fusion #TH19

2023 BBM 1st Version #118

2025 Epoch NPB #167

I'm guessing from looking at all his baseball cards that he started using the blue glove in 2018.  The earliest card I've seen with it is his 2018 BBM 2nd Version card that I shared above.  

Andruw Jones

As you've no doubt heard by now, Andruw Jones was elected to the National Baseball Hall Of Fame in Cooperstown this past week.  What you may not know is that Jones spent the last two years of his career in Japan with the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles.  Jones is now the fourth player with NPB experience to be enshrined in Cooperstown, following Larry Doby (1962 Chunichi Dragons), Rich Gossage (1990 Fukuoka Daiei Hawks) and Ichiro (1992-2000 Orix BlueWave).

Jones signed with the Eagles in December of 2012.  His 434 home runs and 1,289 RBIs were the most ever by a foreign player entering NPB, beating out Frank Howard's almost 40 year old records of 382 home runs and 1,119 RBIs. Jones' timing couldn't have been any better.  2013, of course, was Masahiro Tanaka's amazing undefeated season and the Eagles rode it all the way to their first (and only to date) Nippon Series championship.  Jones would hit a paltry .243 but had 26 home runs and 94 RBIs.  He had 104 walks which helped him have a near .400 OBP (.391) although he also had 164 strikeouts.  He was elected to the Pacific League's All Star team as the DH.  He became the fourth player ever* to homer in both the World Series and the Nippon Series when he hit a three run shot in the first inning of Game Four at Tokyo Dome.  

*Following Johnny Logan, Roy White and Hideki Matsui.  Marwin Gonzalez was the fifth such player

His numbers dropped some in 2014,  His average dipped to .221, and he had just 24 home runs and 74 RBIs.  He drew a Pacific League record 118 walks so his .OBP was again near .400 (.394).  The Eagles released him at the end of the season and he spent 2015 in limbo before announcing his retirement in early 2016.

By my count, Jones had 25 "base set" NPB cards.  He had eleven cards in 2013 - BBM's 1st Version (#263), 2nd Version (#624), Genesis (#089 & #CW090), Eagles team (#E60 & #E84) and Eagles "First Win" (#26) sets; Calbee's Series Two (#138) and Series Three (#AS-23) sets; Bandai's Owners League 02 set (#109) and the Eagles team issued "Heat" set (#64).  He had another twelve in 2014 BBM's 1st Version (#016 & #337), 2nd Version (#461), Genesis (#009), Eagles team (#E57), Icons - Big Guns (#02 & #26) and Eagles "10th Year Memorial" (#88) sets; Calbee's Series Two (#088) and Series Three (#172) sets; Bandai's Owners League 03 set (#001) and the Eagles team issued set (#58).  His final two Japanese cards were from Epoch's two sets with the Japan Retired Foreign Player Association (JRFPA) in 2021 (#29) and 2022 (#25).  Here are the fourteen cards of his that I have, roughly in order of publication:

2013 BBM 1st Version #263

2013 Calbee Series Two #138

2013 BBM 2nd Version #624

2013 Calbee Series Three #AS-23

2014 BBM Eagles 10th Year Memorial #88

2014 BBM Icons - Big Guns #02

2014 BBM Icons - Big Guns #26

2014 BBM 1st Version #016

2014 BBM 1st Version #337

2014 Calbee Series Two #088

2014 BBM 2nd Version #461

2014 Calbee Series Three #172

2021 Epoch JRFPA #29

2022 Epoch JRFPA #25

It's kind of interesting - Jones is listed as an outfielder on the BBM cards when he was an active player but he was mostly a DH.  According to his Baseball-Reference page, he only appeared in one game in the outfield for the Eagles.  He did get into 48 games at first base, though, which may be why his 2022 Epoch JRFPA card lists him as an infielder.

Ohtanis In The Outfield

 

2013 Calbee Series Three #AS-22

I saw a question asked both in comment in an old post here on the blog and over at NPB Reddit about whether the above card of Shohei Ohtani is the only Japanese card of him listing him as an outfielder.  I actually knew from a discussion I'd had on BlueSky recently that it wasn't, but I got curious about how many cards did list his position as an outfielder.  So I took a look.

Before I get to what I found, I want to take a minute and get kind of nit-picky about the Calbee card though.  Technically, it doesn't list Ohtani's position.  Rather it's listing the slot he had on the All Star team - "Pacific League Outfielder".  Now you're probably thinking to yourself "what's the difference?" so let me explain a little bit more.  Players are listed on NPB rosters in four separate categories - "Pitcher", "Catcher", "Infielder" and "Outfielder" - and those four categories are typically what you'll see on their baseball cards.  For example, Munetaka Murakami's cards list him as "Infielder" and not "Third Baseman".  The other cards in the All Star subset from that Calbee set list the actual position for the infielders rather than the generic "Infielder".  For example, Nobuhiro Matsuda is listed as the "Pacific League Third Baseman" and Kazuo Matsui is listed as the "Pacific League Shortstop".  That's because what the card is actually listing is their position for the All Star game and not their general position.  It's splitting hairs to be sure but I wanted to point out that the circumstances for this card are different than those of the other cards in this post.

I research this, I did searches for Ohtani's cards over at Jambalaya and examined the results.  I got my initial list from this and then checked some additional cards that I had that Jambalaya didn't.

What I discovered is that the vast majority of Ohtani's NPB cards list him as "Pitcher" which is what I expected.  As I said above, typically cards of NPB players reflect their category on the team's roster and Ohtani was always listed as a pitcher on the Fighters' rosters.  But I found ten cards that listed him as "Outfielder" - even though he didn't actually play in the field after 2014.  Every card that lists him as an outfielder shows him batting but not every card that shows him batting lists him as an outfielder.  With one exception, it's only BBM cards that listed him as an outfielder.  What's kind of odd is that BBM only did it for their flagship sets and a couple of their Genesis sets.  For the Fighters' team sets, he's always listed as a pitcher - even on the card in the 2013 set that shows him batting.

Without further ado, here are the cards listing him as an outfielder:

2013 Bandai Owners League 02 #074

2014 BBM 1st Version #137 (Batting Version)

2014 BBM Genesis #054

2015 BBM 2nd Version #343

2016 BBM 2nd Version #340

2016 BBM 2nd Version "One and Only" #OO02

2017 BBM 1st Version #002 (Secret Version)

2017 BBM 2nd Version #388

2017 BBM 2nd Version #CS39

2017 BBM Genesis #008

A couple comments:

• It may not be obvious that the Bandai card lists his position as "Outfielder" but if you look at the text in the lower right corner, you'll see "外野手" which is Japanese for "Outfielder"
• This is not a definitive list.  I only have a couple of his Bandai cards and none of his Konami cards as well as only a couple team issued cards.  But I'm pretty confident that I've checked all his BBM, Calbee and Epoch cards
• The 2014 Genesis set has two Ohtani cards - one pitching (#46) and one hitting (#54).  The 2017 set only has the one card
• The 2017 "Cross Squall" subset is the only one of the "Cross" subsets to have two Ohtani cards - one pitching and one hitting.  All the other ones between 2013 and 2016 have only one card that lists him as a pitcher, even if the photo shows him batting

Masahiro Tanaka

After what seemed like forever, Masahiro Tanaka finally got his 200th career win between NPB and MLB yesterday.  He'd gotten to 197 wins after the 2023 season but went winless in his final season with the Eagles last year and it took nine starts this season with the Yomiuri Giants to get those last three wins.

I'm not going to do the usual deep dive into Tanaka's career here because it's pretty well known and I've covered it a lot in the past.  He had a stellar career at Komazawa University Tomakomai High School which culminated in his famous duel with Yuki Saitoh in the finals of the 2006 Summer Koshien Tournament and was taken in the first round of the 2006 draft by the Eagles.  He spent the next seven seasons in Sendai, winning a Rookie Of The Year Award, two Sawamura Awards and an MVP award while capping his tenure off with a phenomenal 24-0 season in which he led the Eagles to their first (and to date only) championship in 2013.

He left for MLB and the Yankees after that and spent seven seasons in pinstripes before returning to Japan and the Eagles for the 2021 season.  His first three years back were somewhat mediocre and then he missed a lot of last season due to an elbow injury.  He ultimately only made one start at the ichi-gun level, giving up four runs in five innings against the Buffaloes on September 28th and took the loss.  That was his last appearance with the Eagles as the team released him at the beginning of December and he signed with the Giants later that month.

I'm again not going to do my usual thing of saying what his rookie cards are and et cetera - I did all that in a post back in late 2013 and I did another post showing a bunch of his cards when he signed with the Yankees a month or so later.  I'll just share a bunch of other cards of his here:

2007 BBM SCM #82

2007 Calbee Series Three #C-11

2009 Eagles Seat Owners Club #18

2013 Topps Tribute WBC Edition #45

2013 BBM Shukan Baseball Season Memorial #1

2013 BBM Masahiro Tanaka Invincibility Legend #25

2014 Calbee Series One #NS-1

2021 BBM 1st Version #087

2022 Epoch One #604

2023 Calbee Series Two #FW-04

2023 Topps NPB #197

2024 Epoch/Eagles Team Set 1st Version #03

2024 Bandai Pro Baseball Deforme #BDC1-E02

A couple comments:

• That's Takeshi Yamazaki with him on the 2007 Calbee checklist card
• That 2014 Calbee card is not officially a Tanaka card as Calbee didn't have the rights to make a card of him that year since he was in MLB.  But that's obviously him in the middle of the crowd.