It's taken me most of the month but I'm finally wrapping up the last of the sets that
Ryan sent me at the end of September. For the third year in a row Ryan tracked down all 12 of BBM's pack based team sets for me.
Also for the third year in a row, BBM's pack based team sets this year each had 81 cards in their base set. Each set featured the team's manager as well as all the players on the team's 70 man roster at the time the set went to press (not that any team actually had 70 players on their roster). The Tigers set also had a card for
ni-gun manager Masayuki Kakefu. Each set also had several subsets and all of them except the Swallows had a single card for all their mascots - the Swallows had three mascot cards. Two of the sets (the Swallows and Baystars) also had a separate checklist card although several of the sets had the set checklist on the back of the mascot card. Here's a breakdown of the cards in each set:
| Team | Player/Manager Cards | Mascot Cards | Checklist | Subsets |
|---|
| Chiba Lotte Marines | 68 | 1 | 0 | Seawall Quartet (4), 2017 New Wave (3), Award winner '16 (5) |
| Chunichi Dragons | 69 | 1 | 0 | New Face (4), Lord Of Dragons (7) |
| Fukuoka Softbank Hawks | 68 | 1 | 0 | Cutting Edge (3), First Headlines (4), Heavy Hitters Squad (5) |
| Hanshin Tigers | 68 | 1 | 0 | Newcomer (3), Milestone (3), Heart Of Tigers (6) |
| Hiroshima Toyo Carp | 68 | 1 | 0 | The Brightest Hope (3), Titlist (9) |
| Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters | 68 | 1 | 0 | 16 Crowns (7), Fresh Face (2), Spring Smash (3) |
| Orix Buffaloes | 67 | 1 | 0 | Newcomer (2), Honor Of Bs(11) |
| Saitama Seibu Lions | 69 | 1 | 0 | Mega Impact(5), High Velocity (3), New Energy(3) |
| Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles | 66 | 1 | 0 | Newcomer (2), Great Promise (3), Eager Eagles(9) |
| Tokyo Yakult Swallows | 67 | 3 | 1 | Aces (1), Rookies (1), Triple Three (3), Full Of Hope (5) |
| Yokohama DeNA Baystars | 68 | 1 | 1 | Tsutsugoh Sequence (3), Yokohama Pride (3), First Draft Pick (3), Vital To V (2) |
| Yomiuri Giants | 68 | 1 | 0 | Play For Giants (6), Giants Elite (3), Giants Axis (3) |
I do want to point out that the Carp team set has a subset dedicated to the award winners from 2016 that SHOULD have been called "Titleist" but is misspelled "Titlist" which of course makes the middle schooler in me giggle uncontrollably.
As always each set features about 30 to 35 players who don't appear in BBM's flagship sets. Here's an example card from each set showing a player who did not appear in either the 1st or 2nd Version sets:
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| 2017 BBM Marines #M17 |
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| 2017 BBM Dragons #D20 |
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| 2017 BBM Hawks #H21 |
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| 2017 BBM Tigers #T63 |
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| 2017 BBM Carp #C49 |
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| 2017 BBM Fighters #F10 |
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| 2017 BBM Buffaloes #Bs07 |
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| 2017 BBM Lions #L44 |
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| 2017 BBM Eagles #E09 |
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| 2017 BBM Swallows #S14 |
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| 2017 BBM Baystars #DB39 |
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| 2017 BBM Giants #G05 |
As you can see, all the sets used a different design. I think the Eagles and Fighters sets ended up being the most attractive this year - both feature a nice card design combined with a good selection of photos.
All the sets were released between March and July.
Thanks as always to Ryan for doing all the work to find these sets for me.
