Size: 407 cards (numbered 433-839)
Cards Per Team: 31 (manager + 30 players)
Team Card Theme: No team cards
Number Of Leader Cards: N/A
Checklists: None
Subsets: New Wave (20), 2002 Retirement Players (15)
Inserts: Opening Game, 03 Record Achievement, MVP (Light Packs only)
Memorabilia Cards: Jersey or windbreaker cards for the 2002 League MVPs - Hideki Matsui and Alex Cabrera; Jersey or windbreaker cards for the 2002 ERA Leaders - Masumi Kuwata and Masahiko Kaneda; Four different Combo Jersey or windbreaker cards - one with Matsui & Cabrera, one with Matsui & Kuwata, one with Cabrera & Kaneda and one with Kuwata & Kaneda. (When I say Jersey or Windbreaker - I don't know for sure which it is. Engel is unclear.)
Parallels: Regular packs - 36 serially numbered (to 500) gold facsimile autographed player cards, seraily numbered (to 100) parallel of the "New Wave" subset cards, serially numbered (to 50) actual autographed parallel of the "Retirement Player" cards. Light Packs - 60 "kira" versions of the player cards, "kira" versions of the Opening Game and Record Achievement inserts
Notable Rookies: ?
The New Wave subset features young players although I'm not sure what their criteria was. The subset includes both rookies and players in their fifth season in 2003. Unusually for a BBM subset, the set does not contain the same number of players per team - there are 3 players apiece for the Hawks and Lions, 2 players apiece for the Carp, Fighters, Baystars and Giants and single players for the other six teams. The players included were Nagisa Arakaki, Kyuji Fujikawa, Katsuaki Furuki, Taketoshi Gotoh, Akihiro Higashide, Daisuke Katoh, Hiroshi Kisanuki, Yuya Kubo, Takuya Matsumoto, Daisuke Matsuzaka, Hichori Morimoto, Shuichi Murata, Katsuhiro Nagakawa, Shuichiro Osada, Kazunari Sanematsu, Toshiya Sugiuchi, Shohei Tateyama, Shiro Teramoto, Daisuke Ue and Tsuyoshi Wada.
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| #812 |
Like the 1st Version set, the 2nd Version set includes a 15 card subset for players who retired after the 2002 season. Not all 15 players are the same between the two sets however. The 2nd Version set includes Toshiyuki Gotoh, Nobuyuki Hoshino, Atsunori Itoh, Yusuke Kawada, Taira Suzuki, Kazuya Tabata, Koji Takekiyo, Masahiro Takumi, Tsutomu Tamura, Shintaro Yamasaki and Tatsuhiro Yuminaga who were not in the 1st set as well as Koji Akiyama, Takehiro Ikeyama, Hiroo Ishii and Koki Morita who were. The pictures on the cards are action shots of the players - occasionally they feature a picture of the player from several years previously - for example Akiyama is shown with the Lions and Ishii is shown with the Buffaloes. Neither player had been with that team for a while.
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| #838 |
The "Opening Game" insert set contained 24 cards featuring the starting pitcher and cleanup hitter from the first game of the season for each team.
The other insert set was called "03 Record Achievement" and featured 10 different players setting some record or reaching some milestone. I'm not sure what all ten players' achievement was - as examples there's a card for Tuffy Rhodes reaching 250 home runs, Kazuo Matsui reaching 300 steals and Masahiro Kawai laying down his 512th sacrifice bunt (passing Eddie Collins for the "world record").
As was the case with 2003 1st Version, the cards available in the Light Packs were a subset of the base set. Only cards 433-804 were available, leaving out the two subsets. On the other hand, both the Opening Game and Record Achievement insert sets were available in the Light Packs (although it looks like only the parallel version were available).
Again following the lead of the 1st Version set, BBM decided to have a different set of parallels for the regular packs and the light packs. In the regular packs it was possible to find gold facsimile autographed cards - there were 36 in all (3 per team) and they were numbered to 500. There was also a parallel version of the "New Wave" cards (numbered to 100) and (like the 1st Version) 50 real autographs for each "Retirement Player" card. In the Light Packs, there were 60 cards with a "Kira" parallel (5 per team) and "Kira" parallels of the two insert sets (I suspect that it was not possible to pull a non-"Kira" insert from the Light Packs).
I don't have both a regular and Kira version of any of the "03 Record Achievement" cards so I'll just show the Kira version of the Kazuo Matsui card:
I'm not a fan of the design of the regular player cards in this set. The most significant thing I can think about them is that this set contains the only card I'm aware of of Leon Lee as manager of the Orix Blue Wave (obviously there are many cards of Leon Lee as player). Lee was the first and still only African-American manager of an NPB team.
Other example cards:
Packs for the 2003 2nd Version set were the first ones to be sold with only nine cards in them rather than the 10 that had been in the packs for BBM's flagship sets since their debut in 1991. The Light Packs would have only four cards per pack.
For the first time in several years, BBM did not include any sort of poster or information sheet inside the box of packs. Instead, the bottom of the box featured the checklist of the set.
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| #OG17 |
The other insert set was called "03 Record Achievement" and featured 10 different players setting some record or reaching some milestone. I'm not sure what all ten players' achievement was - as examples there's a card for Tuffy Rhodes reaching 250 home runs, Kazuo Matsui reaching 300 steals and Masahiro Kawai laying down his 512th sacrifice bunt (passing Eddie Collins for the "world record").
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| #R9 |
As was the case with 2003 1st Version, the cards available in the Light Packs were a subset of the base set. Only cards 433-804 were available, leaving out the two subsets. On the other hand, both the Opening Game and Record Achievement insert sets were available in the Light Packs (although it looks like only the parallel version were available).
Again following the lead of the 1st Version set, BBM decided to have a different set of parallels for the regular packs and the light packs. In the regular packs it was possible to find gold facsimile autographed cards - there were 36 in all (3 per team) and they were numbered to 500. There was also a parallel version of the "New Wave" cards (numbered to 100) and (like the 1st Version) 50 real autographs for each "Retirement Player" card. In the Light Packs, there were 60 cards with a "Kira" parallel (5 per team) and "Kira" parallels of the two insert sets (I suspect that it was not possible to pull a non-"Kira" insert from the Light Packs).
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| Regular & Parallel Versions of #415 |
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| Regular & Kira Versions of #510 |
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| Regular & Kira Versions of #OG22 |
I don't have both a regular and Kira version of any of the "03 Record Achievement" cards so I'll just show the Kira version of the Kazuo Matsui card:
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| Kira Version of #R7 |
I'm not a fan of the design of the regular player cards in this set. The most significant thing I can think about them is that this set contains the only card I'm aware of of Leon Lee as manager of the Orix Blue Wave (obviously there are many cards of Leon Lee as player). Lee was the first and still only African-American manager of an NPB team.
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| #774 |
Other example cards:
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| #728 |
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| #550 |
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| #703 |
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| #440 |
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| Back of #479 (Atsuya Furuta) |
Packs for the 2003 2nd Version set were the first ones to be sold with only nine cards in them rather than the 10 that had been in the packs for BBM's flagship sets since their debut in 1991. The Light Packs would have only four cards per pack.
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| Regular Pack |
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| Light Pack |
For the first time in several years, BBM did not include any sort of poster or information sheet inside the box of packs. Instead, the bottom of the box featured the checklist of the set.
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| Box |
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| Box Bottom |
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| Light Pack Box |
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