Japanse Calbees - Homerun Cards

[jjbond]

So I've found a new niche in Japanese baseball cards to collect. I am trying to find "Homerun Cards" featuring Sadaharu Oh.

Some context - Sadaharu Oh is arguably one of the greatest baseball players ever, earning the world record for most career homeruns - 868. There were hundreds of cards issued for Sadaharu Oh during his career. Calbee is one of the top Japanese baseball card manufacturers (and their cards were often packed with potato chips). Between 1973 and 1980 some of these cards were designated as "Homerun Cards", which were prize cards that could be returned to Calbee for a premium (often there was a choice of which prize you wanted).


These cards featured the regular fronts from the baseball set, but the backside was replaced with a "Homerun Card" designation. (This also makes these cards very difficult to identify, as most Calbee cards are best identified by what the back looks like). And while there were countless other players that had Homerun Cards, I'm focusing on collecting just the ones that feature Sadaharu Oh. While I haven't gotten 868 Homerun Cards, I've got a fair amount now:


Most of these have been redeemed (and then stamped and returned along with the chosen prize), and like most Japanese baseball cards, they aren't in great shape. But I find them fun to try to track down. Let me know if you come across any in your collection that you'd like to get rid of

[seanofjapan]

That is extremely impressive, those home run cards are quite hard to find and are actively sought out by Japanese collectors. I have a few in my collection but probably fewer than you have (and I don’t thin I have any of Oh).

You’ve got some good ones there, the cards marking his 800th home run are pretty hard to find as regular cards, let alone the home run card version. I’m impressed!

[jjbond]

Originally Posted by seanofjapan

That is extremely impressive, those home run cards are quite hard to find and are actively sought out by Japanese collectors. I have a few in my collection but probably fewer than you have (and I don’t thin I have any of Oh).

You’ve got some good ones there, the cards marking his 800th home run are pretty hard to find as regular cards, let alone the home run card version. I’m impressed!

Yeah, those 800th HR cards were the only ones I had to pay real money for
There are some other nice ones out there still, but the prices are through the roof.

I'm also only now realizing how many card fronts were re-used by Calbee in all the subsets (especially for good events), so my hope of properly identifying which card I have seems a bit tricky at times. Curious what SGC or PSA would do with these. (besides grade them all as 1s....)

[seanofjapan]

Yeah, one of the things that has kept me away from actively collecting the home run cards (in addition to the price of some) is the difficulty of identifying the card and set without the back to go on.

PSA has a pretty spotty track record with identifying vintage Calbee cards even with easier sets, (this is my favorite: http://japanesebaseballcards.blogspo...ded-cards.html ), I can only imagine what they would do with home run cards!

[jjbond]

Yeah, a lot of it is just image matching. Scrolling through various sources (ebay, Y!, Prestige, google) for various Oh cards until I find a match. The problem is that so many Calbee cards *aren't* depicted on the internet (which is always fascinating, being on the fringe of internet research, so that a lot of what you're doing is primary research).

For example, the 1977 Japan Series #3 that I have pictured above, I initially checked Engel to see which cards in that set featured Oh. Then I started ruling them out. Eventually it was down to 3, and then someone on Facebook said they had 1 of those 3, and it wasn't it. Then last week I saw one of the final two, and by default, I could pretty safely assume that the card I had was #3. Only tonight did I see a new auction listing that included #3, and proved myself right.

But again, that was a card image that wasn't really used much. I'm finding that a lot of celebratory (#796 HR) images are reused between subsets (and even within the single OH SERIES set, the pics are reused!).

One in particular pictured above is either Osaka Series #122 or Giants Series #102. I'm curious if there's any cropping/color differences that would determine one say or the other.

[Exhibitman]

I pick up Oh cards too. Whatever piques my interest. Here's a 1978 Yamakatsu Oh with the Home Run prize imprint:



Not redeemed. I got it because the image is fantastic.

[seanofjapan]

I love the image on that 78 Yamakatsu Oh card too. I completed that set a couple of years back and have a few homerun cards from it.

[jjbond]

Originally Posted by Exhibitman

I pick up Oh cards too. Whatever piques my interest. Here's a 1978 Yamakatsu Oh with the Home Run prize imprint:



Not redeemed. I got it because the image is fantastic.

That looks awesome! I've got one of those also - the only non-Calbee HR card I've gotten of his. Still looking for others from the Yamakatsu line.

[JustinD]

These are awesome!

Thanks for the new info, I have something else to hunt for now.

[jjbond]

Originally Posted by jjbond

Curious what SGC or PSA would do with these. (besides grade them all as 1s....)

Well, my SGC order is still processing (I feel the Japanese cards I sent them might have slowed down the order), but all of the "homerun" cards I sent them have been marked "2023 Do Not Grade No Charge" - so I guess that answers that question. I wonder if PSA has a similar policy...

[Exhibitman]

Originally Posted by JustinD

These are awesome!

Yamakatsu makes amazing cards.