Missing In Action - Hideo Nomo

When it comes to guys who've been left out of Japanese card sets, there's no one who's been left out more than Hideo Nomo.

After playing a couple seasons for Nippon Steel of the industrial leagues after graduating high school and playing on the 1988 Japanese Olympic Baseball Team, Nomo was selected by a record eight teams in the first round of the fall 1989 draft.  The Kintetsu Buffaloes won the lottery for his rights and he made his debut the following season.  And what a season it was - Nome went 18-8 with a 2.91 ERA and 287 strikeouts in 235 innings pitched.  He led the Pacific League in wins, strikeouts and ERA and became only the second NPB player ever to win the MVP, Rookie Of The Year and Sawamura Awards (and he was the only guy to win all three in one year).  He also was named to the Pacific League's Best 9 that year.  He followed that up with a three more seasons of leading the Pacific League in wins and strikeouts before having a so-so year in 1994, much of which was caused by his disagreements with the team and manager Keishi Suzuki.

Nomo's agent, Don Nomura, had found a loophole in the MLB and NPB agreement that would allow Nomo to become a free agent and sign with an MLB team so after the 1994 season he voluntarily retired from NPB and signed a deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers.  He sent 13-6 with an ERA of 2.54 ERA and a National League leading 236 strikeouts in his first season in MLB.  He won the NL Rookie Of The Year award, becoming the only player ever to win the award in both NPB and MLB.  He spent most of the following ten seasons in the majors, playing for Dodgers, Mets, Tigers, Red Sox and Devil Rays.  He threw two no-hitters, both the first and so far only ones thrown at two hitter friendly ballparks - Coors Field in Denver (for the Dodgers against the Rockies in 1996) and Oriole Park At Camden Yards in Baltimore (for the Red Sox against the Orioles in 2001).  After a couple of seasons in the minors he returned to the majors in 2008 with the Royals but was released after pitching poorly in three outings and retired a few months later.

Nomo won 201 games between MLB and NPB (123 in MLB, 78 in NPB) and struck out 3122 batters (1918 in MLB, 1204 in NPB).  The 200 wins earned him a spot in the Meikyukai and he was elected to the Japanese Hall Of Fame in 2014, his first year of eligibility.  He was only the third player ever elected to the Hall Of Fame on the first ballot (after Victor Starffin and Sadaharu Oh) and was the youngest player (at 45 years and four months) ever elected.

Nomo had many cards during his five seasons in Japan.  He only had one card in 1990 (in the Takara Buffaloes team set) but he had at least fifty in the following four seasons, mostly from BBM, Calbee, and Takara but also Q-Cards and Tomy.

1990 Takara Buffaloes #11

1991 BBM #379

1992 BBM #4

1993 Calbee #8

1994 BBM All Stars #A48

But after 1994 - absolutely nothing.  There are no NPB cards of Nomo after 1994.  In fact the only Japanese cards I know of for Nomo after he left for MLB are from the 2003 Topps/Kanebo set that depict Nomo as a Dodger.  He might be in some of the other MLB sets made for the Japanese market in the early 00's but I haven't been able to find a checklist to verify. 

Actually I need to add a caveat to that.  Like Warren Cromartie, Nomo had four cards in the 2000 BBM 20th Century Best 9 set but none of them show his picture:

2000 BBM 20th Century Best 9 #024

There's a fairly large number of BBM sets that could reasonably have been expected to include Nomo - the 2004 and 2010 Kintetsu Memorial sets (the 2004 one was for the team "merging" with Orix while the 2010 one was for the team's 60th Anniversary), the 2010 (BBM) 20th Anniversary set, the 2013 Osaka Limited set (he was born in Osaka), the 2014 80th Anniversary Pitchers Edition set, the 2014 All Star Game Memories 90's set, the 2014 Buffaloes Achievement set, the 2015 (BBM) 25th Anniversary set, the 2016 Spirit Of Legends box set (featuring Sawamura Award winners) as well as any number of the annual "Historic Collection" sets BBM did between 2002 and 2016.  He also would not have been out of place in any of Epoch's sets with the All Japan Baseball Foundation/Japan Baseball Promotion Association/OB Club or either of Calbee's Anniversary subsets for their 30th (2002) and 40th (2012) Anniversaries.  All of these opportunities and yet no Nomo appearances.

I have no idea why Nomo has not appeared on an NPB card since 1994.  It could be that the league still harbors resentment towards him for the way he left and has forbidden license holders to make cards of him.  It could be that Nomo himself harbors resentment towards the league and doesn't want to appear in any cards of theirs.  It could be some combination of both. 

Missing In Action - Warren Cromartie

For a while now I've been wanting to talk about players who for whatever reason don't show up in Japanese sets very often.  Now obviously I'm talking about retired players as pretty much every active non-ikusei player has a card each year - even if it's only in one of BBM's "comprehensive" team sets.  I thought I'd start a series of posts for players who appear to be missing with some regularity.

Warren Cromartie was a regular outfielder for the Montreal Expos from 1977 to 1983.  He left Montreal as a free agent but didn't receive any offers he liked from MLB teams so he ended up signing a contract with the Yomiuri Giants.  He spent the next seven seasons with the team, hitting .321 with 171 home runs over that time.  He won the Central League MVP in 1989, was selected to the All-Star team three times (1985, 1989, 1990) and made the postseason Best 9 team three times as well (1986, 1987 and 1989).  He also led the league in batting in 1989 with a .378 average.  He returned to MLB in 1991 and spent one season with the Kansas City Royals.

Cromartie had many cards during his career in Japan.  Despite apparently not having any cards in his first year in Japan (1984), he had more than 30 Calbee cards between 1985 and 1990.  He was also in each of the Takara team sets for the Giants over the same period of time.  There's a couple other sets I know of that he appeared in including the 1987 Amada Heat-Sensitive Giants set, the 1987 Play Ball set and the 1988 JBR 22 bromide set.  It is somewhat surprising to me however that he does not appear in the Lotte sets from 1989 and 1990.

1985 Calbee #70

1986 Calbee #201

1987 Amada Heat-Sensitive Giants

1988 JBR22

1989 Takara Giants #49

1990 Takara Giants #49

The photo on the JBR 22 card was likely swiped from a Calbee card.

He's appeared in very few Japanese cards since his retirement however.  He's in only three BBM sets that I know of - the "Nostalgic Stars" subset in the 1994 set, the 2008 "Back To The 80's" set and the 2013 "Legendary Foreigners" set (2 cards).

1994 BBM #541

2009 BBM Back To The 80's #010

2013 BBM Legendary Foreigners #30

2013 BBM Legendary Foreigners #78

I will add a caveat to that last statement by saying that there are four cards for him in the 2000 BBM 20th Century Best 9 set but none of them show his photo.

2000 BBM 20th Century Best 9 #114

There have been a number of BBM sets that I would have expected him to show up in such as the 70th and 80th Giants Anniversary sets, the 2013 All Star Memories 80's set, the 2014 80th Anniversary Batters Edition set, and the 2018 Time Travel 1979 set.  I've no idea why he hasn't appeared in these sets.  Other Americans who played in Japan for several seasons around the same time, such as Randy Bass and Boomer Wells, show up frequently in sets from both BBM and Epoch.

Thanks to John E. Gibson of the Japan Baseball Weekly Podcast I had the opportunity to reach out to Mr. Cromartie a few months back.  John was kind enough to forward some questions I had to him.  John warned me that it was likely that Mr. Cromartie would probably not respond as he was very busy but, to the surprise of both of us, he sent back answers to my questions.  I tried to get some follow up questions answered as well but John did not get a reply back from Mr. Cromartie.

I specifically asked him why he had not appeared in many of the retired player sets.  The gist of his reply was that he had never been contacted by BBM for ANY retired player sets, including the ones he had appeared in!  "I must be honest," he wrote, "I have not seen any of these retired player baseball cards so if you see any please let me know.  Obviously they have them without my approval."  He added that "All they need to do is ask me directly."

I fear that I've not explained what the sets were adequately and that he has seen the cards.  I included scans of the cards in my follow up expecting him to reply "Oh - THOSE cards!  Well, why didn't you say so?"  I find it much easier to believe that I asked a confusing question than BBM has published cards of a player without his permission.  One piece of evidence that he did not know about the cards however - there's no autographed card for him in the 2013 Legendary Foreigners set.

I want to express my gratitude to Warren Cromartie for taking the time to answer my questions and to John for acting as an intermediary between us.