In 1991, BBM revolutionized the Japanese baseball card industry by creating the first modern American style baseball card set. The 400 card set was the first to contain cards of virtually every current Japan Pro Baseball player. The card size was similar to the size of Topps baseball cards. The card layout, front and back, was reminiscent of American cards. The cards were packed 10 to a pack, with 30 packs in a box. There was a parallel team hologram insert set with a parallel card inserted into the occasional pack. 30 years later, BBM is still the leader in producing annual baseball sets featuring Japan Pro players.

The 1991 set was introduced at a propitious time, since it corresponded to the beginning of Hideo Nomo's career. Not only did BBM issue a regular issue rookie card of Nomo, but also a special six card Nomo subset was included. The set also contains cards of several players who were among the vanguard of Japanese pitchers to play in the American major leagues, such as former A.L. ROY Kazuhiro Sasaki, Shigetoshi Hasegawa, Hideki Irabu, Masato Yoshii, Masao Kida, Shingo Takatsu, etc. Additionally, numerous Japan Hall of Famers/Golden players are included in the set, such as Kazuhiro Kiyohara, Koji Akiyama, Hiromitsu Ochiai, Tatsunori Hara, Hiromasa Arai, Yukio Tanaka, Masaki Saito, Kazuyoshi Tatsunami, Tomonori Maeda, Hiromitsu Kadota, etc., etc. There are also 29 cards of North Americans who were playing in Japan at the time, including Orestes Destrade, Ozzie Canseco, Tom O'Malley, Ralph Bryant, R. J. Reynolds, Johnny Ray, and many more. To cap it off, there is an All Time Greats subset with cards of Sadaharu Oh, Shigeo Nagashima, Minoru Murayama, Isao Harimoto, Kazuhisa Inao, etc.

All in all, this was quite the maiden effort for BBM, the company that has become the king of Japanese baseball cards. Upon opening the 300 cards in this lot, you should be well on your way to completing the 400 set, and you will probably find a hologram.

Size: Each card is 2 3/8" x 3 3/8".

Condition: The box is Nm. Nearly all cards inside should be Nm/Mt and Mt.