New Release: 2014 BBM Pitchers Spirits of Carp

Two pitcher-related sets came out last week. One of them, below, features only pitchers who played or are playing for the Hiroshima Carp.

The base cards don't look too bad, though without checking I think they've used this design before. The backs reuse the picture from the front, cropping it to more of a head shot. The usual details are on the back, including statistics, biographical details, and a highlights summary. There are 27 cards in the set, 18 retired players with a brown border and nine active players with a red border on the front. 3000 sets were produced and sold in box set form with one special card.

 Eighteen of the players have autographed cards. Sasaoka has the most complicated signature I've seen on a Japanese baseball card, and if I have the chance to buy it I'd like to add one to my collection. The OB (retired) players have print runs of 90 or 120, with Yamauchi having only 30 cards. Active pitchers have print runs of 30 or 60 cards.

Some boxes have relics instead of autographs. There are nine cards with print runs of 60-250 copies each. All cards use jerseys (7 cards) or undershirts (2 cards). Jersey cards have patch parallels limited to 20 copies each.