I've been fortunate to have a local sport card legend living and working "right around the corner" from where I live.  Mike Jaspersen is the owner of Jaspy's, a brick-and-mortar store in Hermosa Beach, CA which also has a very successful and popular breaking business, Jaspy's Case Breaks.  Coincidently, they just broke a box of Panini Immaculate and landed a 1-of-1 Logoman of Lebron James a few days ago that has been making its way around news wires across the country as this likely is a 6-figure card.  Mike runs a great business and just opened back up after having been closed for a while due to COVID.  I was in there the other day and noticed an autographed card of himself that had been issued in the 2017 Allen and Ginter product.  Mike explained that he had signed 10 of them and he talked briefly about the Topps representative stopping by for him to sign before moving on to other people in the area.  I did not have an opportunity to ask why he was featured on the card, but I picked up a copy for myself and plan on swinging by here shortly to inquire.  It does state on the back that he was the "A&G Las Vegas Party Winner", so excited to get more information on that.  Mike has a very interesting history in the hobby and here is an interview from several years ago by Sports Collectors Digest.

Anyone else ever get to meet someone who was featured on a trading card besides an athlete?

Every sport has a Greatest Of All Time (GOAT).  Baseball has Ruth, Basketball has Jordan, Hockey has Gretsky, Football has Brady, Soccer has Pele.....the list can go on and on for all the sports.  In sumo wrestling, the arguably GOAT is current Yokozuna Hakuho.  Here are a few reasons why he has been given this title by many fans...

- 43 Career Championships.....10 more than the next closest wrestler
- 15 Perfect (0-loss) Championships.....7 more than the next closest wrestler
- 1147 Career wins...100 more than the next closest wrestler
- 75 tournaments ranked as a Yokozuna...12 more than the next closest wrestler

I could dig up more statistics, but Hakuho's lifetime of achievment is staggering.  If these aren't GOAT statistics, I don't know what is.  He looks as if he could compete for 3-4 more years easily and be competitive in each of the tournaments he competes in. 

For those that know me, I don't chase autographed cards...or at least go out of my way for any, but the one that I always would compromise on if I found it was a good, authenticated Hakuho signed card.  For reference, there are 4 ways to get authenticated BBM signed cards of sumo wresters:

1. Pack Issued - Sticker autos with serial numbering issued in BBM's annual card releases
2. Official Event Signed - Gold ink, on-card autos with embossed seals given as prizes at official BBM card events around Japan
3. Kokugikan (Sports Arena) Signed - On-card autos encased in a red and white-colored acrylic case with the BBM and Kokugikan logos.  They also come with two acrylic legs to prop it up on your desk
4. In-Person Signed

In July 2017, Hakuho surpassed Ozeki Kaio for the most career wins (the record at the time was 1147 wins).  The Kokugikan and BBM collaborated to release a special signed 2017 Tamashi card where Hakuho wrote "1050 勝" "1050 wins" along with his signature on one of the Kokugikan-Signed cards.  One of my collecting buddies happened to have two of them and was thinning his collection a bit and I knew this was the card that needed to be in my collection.  I'm not sure how many of these are out there, but likely fewer than 100.  Regardless, the GOAT has touched and signed this card!





I hope everyone enjoys the Super Bowl! 

It's nice to be back on the grid again with internet.  It took the better part of three weeks to arrange for the repair guy to get out here and exchange our modem with a functioning one, but here we are.  Trying to post anything on my iPhone is frustrating so I held out until I could get back in front of a computer and scanner.  I'm not sure I was too missed, but I sure missed posting.

This summer has been busy with sumo card pickups with a variety of unique and fun items I am hoping to share at some point.  One interesting discovery has been these gold-signed BBM Event Cards.  BBM has promotions around the country (Japan) for its new releases and some of the prizes for the sumo events are these gold-signed cards.  All of them are signed with a gold Sharpie and then embossed with an authentic BBM raised seal.  The scan below doesn't pick up the seal well, but what is really interesting is these are on-card autographs, while the regular signed cards in BBM boxes are sticker autographs.  These are much cooler and unique in my mind than the regular issues.  Here is then-Maegashira Tochinoshin's 2017 Regular Issue card with his auto across the front.

According to BBM's Event Website, if you spent 500 yen at a participating store event, you would be eligible for a kuji drawing, or lottery drawing.  Basically an instant win chance.  If you happened to pull the #1 prize, normally you'd get a box of cards.  A 2nd place prize are these signed cards and a 3rd place pull garnered you 10 free packs of cards.

They do these events for all the BBM releases and so you'll see baseball, soccer, boxing, etc...  I can't image there are more than a handful of cards for each wrestler making these a fun collectible to chase.  Look for the gold ink and raised seal to know they are authentic.

Let's face it...there needs to be more curling card sets produced.  This sport seem to be gaining more and more popularity each and every Olympics.  I remember that before the 1998 Nagano Olympics the majority of people had never heard of curling (me included).  After it was first televised that year, it became almost an instant hit and each and every Olympics it is one sport I really look forward to watching.  The Japanese team is ranked in the Top 10 worldwide in both men's and women's curling, but are not favored to medal in the Olympics this year.  Regardless, they have a pretty solid team.  The Japanese did not do an Olympic set this year, but they did manage to capture the Japanese Olympic team in the 2017 BBM Infinity Set.  Sadly, I don't have all the 10 curling cards in the set, but here are the six that I do have.

#80: Yusuke Morozumi - not shown
#81: Tetsuro Shimizu
#82: Tsuyoshi Yamaguchi
#83: Kosuke Morozumi
#84: Kosuke Hirata
#85: Satsuki Fujisawa - not shown
#86: Chinami Yoshida
#87: Yumi Suzuki - not shown
#88: Yurika Yoshida
#89: Mari Motohashi - not shown

P-Town Tom is running his annual Favorite-Card-Of-The-Year contest.  Here is mine....the Japanese Sumo Dude insert from Allen & Ginter.  I think this is Yokozuna Tamanishiki, but I am not a 100% certain.

It definitely has been an exciting year and one full of lots of adventures.  The biggest is that we moved to Germany and, along with the move, all the exciting adventures in travel, culture, and card collecting that come with it.  It was a busy 2017 in terms of my card collection so I'd like to wrap up the progress on my goals that I set for myself this year so I can clear my conscious and set some new goals for 2018.  Here are the 6 goals I set for myself this year:
1.  Finish the 4th Edition of my Sumo Menko & Card Checklist. (A+)
- I did it!  With a ton of work and some late nights, I was able to push out the latest edition of my book.  Every year I am finding new sets and expanding on others so it was time for a refresh of my book.  I am already stockpiling new material for the next edition and at this rate am going to aim for a Summer/Fall 2019 release.

2.  Focus on branching out of the sumo world and collecting cards of the local German sports teams and hopefully the main sets of the entire league. (F)
- This goal did not come to fruition and I can't see myself picking this up as a goal in 2018 either.  The modern card and collecting market here in Germany really doesn't lend itself to the kind of collecting I want to do.  Plus, we haven't really invested time in following any local teams with any sort of passion.  It was a valiant effort, but RIP goal #2!

3. "Discover" and catalogue at least 5 vintage sumo sets (pre-1960), add at least 3 of the 1973 Calbee cards to my set, and complete the base 2017 BBM set from opening boxes and trading. (A-)
- I did extremely well on this goal.  I knocked the number of vintage sets out of the park, picked up a few 1973 Calbee cards, and have almost completed the 2017 BBM Sumo Set.  With respect to the BBM set, I need to see how many cards I fell short, but I am almost there.  I'll likely have a similar goal for next year.

4. Start collecting Murai Tobacco Cards. (A+)
- I did well on this goal.... although someone warned me what I was getting myself into here.  I ended up picking up 6 Murai cards which I thought was a week accomplishment at first until I realized how difficult these are to find.  I'll likely carry this goal over to next year as well.



5. Build the 2017 Topps Heritage set and I plan on trying to complete that set through boxes and trading. (D)
- I bought a few packs, but I just couldn't muster up the momentum to working on this set, nor even come close to finishing it.  Sadly, as much as I really want to come back to collecting some American sports cards, there are too many Japanese interests pulling me in other directions.  RIP Goal #5!


6. Interviews! (D)
- Lots of thought went into this one of how exactly I want to do this, but no action yet.  I will likely pull this over to next year as I might be ready at that point.  My main problem is I don't want to half-ass anything and I want to be able to ask interesting questions on a variety of topics.  More to follow on this one in my 2018 Collecting Goals Blog.

Overall Grade - B
- Math in public, combined with a subjective score of how I felt I did, puts me at a B.  It was a great year!

This is the last post on my 2017 Japanese BBM Infinity Box Break.  You can see the results of my first and second box breaks by clicking on the links.  This part will only be 4 packs long.  One unopnened pack is going to fellow BBM sumo enthusiast Paul for his unopened box collection and another unopened pack is going to longtime blog reader Fuji for his Japanese collection.

Pack 15: Starting off to bat...pun intended...is an 80% baseball pack including another Brilliant Athlete.  Some old school soccer in here as well.


Pack 16: Starting to see more and more doubles!



Pack 18:  Back to back Onokuni, but I nailed an Ohtani baseball card!

Overall impressions:  I like this set and I really like the variety of athletes they used.  Baseball tends to dominate and it did in this set as well.  Also, who can complain about on-card autos??!!  The athlete actually touched the card as they were writing on it.  Way to go BBM.  Although I can't say all the autos are on card.  My two biggest complaints are the lack of imagination on the front and back images (they are the same).  This has been my biggest complaint of BBM in recent years.  Also, the production quality is subpar.  I felt like a good majority of my cards did not look mint coming right out of the box.  There were corner dings as well as bubbles in the surface of some cards.  Baseball fans might be justified in buying a box, but it is quite an investment for fans of other sports as you only get a sprinkling of cards.

This is a continuation of my first thread where I opened 7 packs.  Here are the next 7 packs.  Let's hope I can get some more base sumo cards.

Pack 8:  Some freestyle skiing love in this pack.  I might be entering the double realm soon.

Pack 9:  Curling and Badminton and my second Brilliant Athlete insert card.
Pack 10: Gotta love Bodybuilding cards.

Pack 11:  Boom!  I hit the auto card (Rugby Player Kiyoshi Imaizumi) in this box!  It is #1/60 and an actual on-card auto...no sticker!

Pack 12:  Starting to see some doubles....


Pack 13:  Nailed another base sumo....Kaio!

Pack 14: Another Brilliant Athlete badminton insert card.  Must be a badminton hot box!!!

Definitely a great 7 packs.  I'll open up the last packs in the next few days.

BBM just released another multi-sport set called Infinity.  For those that bought the Masterpiece set last year, Infinity falls right in line with that.  This set has mostly baseball players (42) along with a variety of other sports including Curling, Speed Skating, Ice Hockey, Pro Wrestling, Tennis, and Badminton to name a few.  Some of the players are still active while others have been retired for a while.  Most importantly for this blog are the 5 sumo wrestlers that are included in the base set along with a few sprinkled in insert sets.  This is an All-Japanese set so you likely won't find many names that you recognize unless you follow a particular Japanese sport.  There are 112 cards in the Base Set along with 4 Insert Sets: a 9-card All the Glory set, a 9-card One and Only set, an 18-card Brilliant Athlete set, and a large autograph set.  I believe the Brilliant Athlete set also has foil-stamped facsimile parallels in it.  Likewise, the One and Only set has holographic parallels #ed to 50.

I bought two of these boxes off of Rakuten and I am going to rip one here and keep the other one for a rainy day.  Packs come 20 per box with 5 cards per pack.  Let's keep fingers crossed for some sumo cards!

Pack 1:  Pro Wrestler Masakatsu Funaki and Horse Jockey Yutaka take make their debut.

Pack 2: A Baseball Heavy Pack
Pack 3: Boom, my first sumo card....the cropping on this card is a little weird though

Pack 4:  An eclectic pack for sure and I snagged a Brilliant Athlete insert...Naoko Takahashi.  Awesome to see a female hockey player too.
Pack 5: Another sumo wrestler...Kisenosato.  This is a Speed-Skating heavy pack.
Pack 6:  Some old school images here and another speed skater.
Pack 7:  MMA, Curling, and Baseball all in the same pack!  I love this set.
I'll bust another 7 packs and post in the next few days.  Until then...enjoy!

A few weeks ago, BBM released a boxed set of B.League basketball cards that included players from both the B1 and B2 levels of the league...the set is called High Five.  Because of the inclusion of the B2 teams we now get cards from teams such as the Fukushima Firebirds, Iwate Big Bulls, Cyberdyne Ibaraki Robots, and Earth Friends Tokyo Z.  There are 54 cards in the base set and 2 signature cards included in each boxed set.  The big chase is the autograph cards, though.  I was pretty impressed opening up the box and seeing the cards for the first time.  They are really cool with the silver foil highlights. 





All 56 cards come in a cardboard box as seen above and wrapped in a sturdy cellophane band.  Somehow, though, my set moved around and card number #1 got dinged on the left corners.  The backs feature some basic facts and a full-body posed picture.  I really like the looks of these cards.  I got autos of Narito Namizato from the Shiga Lakestars and Shingo Utsumi from the Kyoto Hannaryz.....both numbered to /105  Some scans of the cards are below...but the silver foil does not show up in the scans unfortunately.  I bought a few sets and will keep them sealed except for this one.  The sets can still be purchased online so they must have made plenty of them to meet the expected demand.


They are a little spendy and Niki at Rakuten still has them for sale at around US$41 without shipping.  I don't chase autographs so am happy with this base set...I am really hoping we see more B.League sets at the beginning of next season toward the end of this year.

Congrats to the 2017 Japanese B. League Basketball Champions...the Tochigi Brex and my man Yuta Tabuse!!  Whoop. They beat the Toshiba Brave Thunder 85-79.  Here is the 12-minute highlight reel from the game.  They had a nice 4th-quarter comeback for sure.  Here are the 8 cards included in the 1st and 2nd half sets:



The awards show for the league was held Tuesday, 30 May where Nick Fazekas of the losing BRave Thunder (and former NBA player) was named B.League MVP as well as to the Best-5 team.  Here is Nick's first B.League card as well as the other 4 players on the Best-5 Team: Yuki Togashi, Daiki Tanaka, Makoto Hiejima and Kosuke Kanamaru.


Rounding out the final awards, Leo Verdrame won Rookie of the Year Honors, Yusuke Endo took home Best Defender and Tyler Stone was the Best 6th Man (No B.League Card).


For those that can't wait for the regular season to start again, B.League is holding 4 regional pre-season tournaments simultaneously in September called the 2017 Early Cup  (actually the Tohoku tourney is one week after the others)....more details here on the Early Cup.

I have a special B.Leauge set called "High Five" that I will bust and post the results here.

I recently opened a box of 2017 BBM Sumo Wrestling Tamashii and was pleasantly surprised by the overall design and collation.  While I did not get a complete set, I was only 12 cards short and did not get any triples.  No special auto inserts, but I am predominately a base set collector so no disappointment there.  I should be able to trade for the 12 I need and hopefully help others complete their sets.  Another box break by Paul on Facebook's BBM Sumo Card Collectors group also left him 12 cards short.  I am really pleased with the overall look...my only feedback to BBM is to lose the horizontal format on some cards in the Kisenosato subset and go all vertical with them.  It would provide more visual consistency in my opinion. 

Also, congrats to Yokozuna Hakuho for his zensho-yusho (perfect 15-win tournament) and winning his 38th Championship.  I have a feeling he is gunning for at least 40.  Runners up include Ozeki Terunofuni and Maegashira Tochinoshin.  I've included some of their 2017 BBM Tamashii cards below.

Here is the translated checklist of the second sumo set to come out in 2017 "Tamashii".  They release in Japan this week so hope to have some examples in hand next week.  Checklist and photos courtesy of Mint.








Regular Cards #1 - Yokozuna Hakuho
#2 - Yokozuna Kakuryu
#3 - Yokozuna Harumafuji
#4 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#5 - Ozeki Goeido
#6 - Ozeki Terunofuji
#7 - Sekiwake Tamawashi
#8 - Sekiwake Takayasu
#9 - Sekiwake Kotoshogiku
#10 - Komusubi Mitakeumi
#11 - Komusubi Shodai
#12 - Maegashira Takekaze
#13 - Maegashira Ikioi
#14 - Maegashira Sokokurai
#15 - Maegashira Takanoiwa
#16 - Maegashira Shohozan
#17 - Maegashira Takarafuji
#18 - Maegashira Yoshikaze
#19 - Maegashira Arawashi
#20 - Maegashira Endo
#21 - Maegashira Hokutofuji
#22 - Maegashira Chiyonokuni
#23 - Maegashira Aoiyama
#24 - Maegashira Ichinojo
#25 - Maegashira Chiyoshoma
#26 - Maegashira Kaisei
#27 - Maegashira Okinoumi
#28 - Maegashira Kagayaki
#29 - Maegashira Kotoyuki
#30 - Maegashira Tochinoshin
#31 - Maegashira Tochiozan
#32 - Maegashira Daieisho
#33 - Maegashira Ishiura
#34 - Maegashira Sadanoumi
#35 - Maegashira Ura
#36 - Maegashira Takakeisho
#37 - Maegashira Daishomaru
#38 - Maegashira Myogiryu
#39 - Maegashira Kyokushoho
#40 - Maegashira Chiyoo
#41 - Maegashira Tokushoryu
#42 - Maegashira Nishikigi
Fighting Men Cards
#43 - Yokozuna Hakuho
#44 - Yokozuna Kakuryu
#45 - Yokozuna Harumafuji
#46 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#47 - Ozeki Goeido
#48 - Ozeki Terunofuji
#49 - Sekiwake Tamawashi
#50 - Sekiwake Takayasu
#51 - Sekiwake Kotoshogiku
#52 - Komusubi Mitakeumi
#53 - Komusubi Shodai
#54 - Maegashira Endo
Kisenosato Career Cards
#55 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#56 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#57 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#58 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#59 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#60 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#61 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#62 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
#63 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
New Yokozuna Dohyo Iri
#64 - Yokozuna Kokutoumi
#65 - Yokozuna Onokuni
#66 - Yokozuna Asahifuji
#67 - Yokozuna Takanohana
#68 - Yokozuna Musashimaru
#69 - Yokozuna Hakuho
#70 - Yokozuna Harumafuji
#71 - Yokozuna Kakuryu
#72 - Yokozuna Kisenosato
Technique Cards
#73 - Yokozuna Hakuho
#74 - Maegashira Takekaze
#75 - Maegashira Okinoumi
#76 - Maegashira Ishiura
#77 - Maegashira Ura
#78 - Maegashira Ura
#79 - Juryo Kotoeko
#80 - Juryo Satoyama
New Juryo Card
#81 - Makushita Takagenji
Special Insert Autograph Cards
Komusubi Mitakeumi
Maegashira Sokokurai
Maegashira Hokutofuji
Maegashira Chiyonokuni
Maegashira Kagayaki
Maegashira Daieisho
Maegashira Ishiura
Maegashira Ura
Maegashira Takakeisho