2019 BBM Japanese Sumo Wrestling Cards - Box Review

I hope everyone is recovering from Super Bowl Sunday...or Super Bowl Monday if you are over here in Europe or Japan.  The 1230 am kickoff is going to be brutal for me, but a once-a-year shock to the body that will definitely be worth it.

Back to sumo cards, the 2019 BBM Sumo Wrestling Card Set hit the shelves a few weeks back and for the first time in I don't remember how long, I am not able to bust a box right away.  It seems the company I've been using regularly for 5ish years decided they didn't want to ship to a military post box anymore. Oh well.  It could be worse and I'll eventually get my box, but have to live the experience through my collecting friends.  One of those friends being Tony offered up some of his thoughts for this post:

Overall thoughts on the set?

 

Overall, I felt the set is pretty good, but the background colors aren't as elaborate as the 2018 set.  The backstage pass cards are cool. (Ryan's thoughts.....the pre-release photos showed them with rounded corners, but it was only a rounded-corner image on a regular trading card...booo).  It's nice seeing the rikishi having a good time and there seems to be more hits in these boxes.  So far we're 3 for 3 on the Facebook Group's boxes getting an autograph.

 

 

Favorite Card?



 

I could honestly say it's my Abi autographed card I got, but that would be a given.  My favorite base card is the Takayasu backstage pass where he is playing baseball in his mawashi.  You can just see how much fun he is having.

 

Favorite Part of the Design?



 

I like the gloss on the card.  I think most all [BBM] cards are like that now.  But I think it adds so much more to the color.  They really pop for sure.  And I like that they're adding the names in English as it helps with us gaijin fans.

 

 

How close were you to completing the base set?



 

I was 9 cards away from completing the base set.  So 80/90 is pretty good odds (Ryan's comments: The set is numbered to 90, but card #21 was removed from the set since Maegashira Takanoiwa was kicked out of the Sumo Association for assaulting a fellow wrestler.  Instead of renumbering the set, BBM simply removed 21 leaving only 89 cards in the base set.)

 

Any other comments?



 

I really hope they're [BBM] reading our comments online and adding more hits to the boxes.  It makes it much more worth buying an unopened box rather than buying a complete set off line for more than half the price.  I think the base cards could use some more action poses that pre-Tachiai poses.  There are some great pictures of flips and throws that would make awesome cards.  Similar to the fight series in last year's set.  Maybe if we could get some retailers here in the States as well.  All in all, I'm happy and will continue to buy them as long as they make them.  (Ryan's comment's:  I couldn't agree more.  BBM is stagnating in the creativity department for their sumo set.  It's like the interns and new designers get the sumo sets to get their feet wet in the basics and then move on to the harder, more interestingly designed sets.)

 

Thanks Tony for contributing to this week's blog post and best of luck trading!