Japanese Preview: Cards from Jim!

The Japan blog is live: Chaos and Kanji can be found at http://japanryan.blogspot.com!

I met up with Jim one last time before heading overseas, and after a delicious sausage and a totally awesome slice of banana cream pie, we exchanged our little gifts. I was pleasantly surprised to see some Japanese cards he had from one of his friends!

There were cards from four different issues (I think!) and I'll spread them out set by set over the rest of the week. There's a great ending on Friday!

 This first pack comes from BBM 2008 "1st Version" - which is series one.

 The cards look good. They're photo-focused, with minimal design.

 The only real design is the translucent yellow-orange border across the bottom with the player's name, team, position, jersey number, and the name of the set.

 This team checklist is part of the regular set. There are cheerleaders at Japanese baseball games. I am totally going to Japanese baseball games.

 Notice the green border? Rookies get the green border instead of the yellow-orange border. Of course, it also says "ROOKIE" above the player name.

 The photo quality is about the same as flagship Topps. The cards are a little thinner, but they don't feel cheap by any means.

Another rookie. BBM does a great job of labeling their sets. The "1st Version" on the front also appears on the back. I should have very little problems cataloging BBM cards I find in Japan!

Tune in tomorrow for another Japanese pack!

(Editor's Note: this post is being written while I'm still in San Francisco. Emails and comments this week might receive very slow response.)