Man, I’ve been digging through my old stuff lately, and you won’t believe what I found – a box of old 1950 Menko Japan baseball cards! I totally forgot I even had these. I started collecting these Japanese Menkos a while back. It was kind of a spur-of-the-moment thing, you know? I’ve been blogging about Japanese baseball cards for 3 years now, and the most charming type of Japanese always got my heart.
First thing I did was look them over carefully. I grabbed the first one, a rectangular Menko card of a Stars player. I did some research online, and it seems like it’s from some uncataloged set. After a lot of digging, I figured out it was Makoto Kozuru.
These cards are pretty different from the American ones I’m used to. Back in the early 1900s, Menko was a popular disc game in Japan, kind of like pogs. So, these cards have all sorts of things on them besides just the player’s picture and stats. I saw big numbers, math equations, playing card symbols, and even those rock/paper/scissors symbols. The earliest known baseball menko was from 1897. How crazy!
Next, I really wanted to see if these cards were the real deal. I examined the card’s printing quality. I checked out the sharpness and clarity. I looked closely at the player’s photo, the team logo, and the text. I was checking for any blurry or fuzzy details because those are usually red flags. Luckily, everything looked pretty crisp and well-defined.
- Looked over each card for details like player names, teams, and any unique markings.
- Checked out the printing quality, looking for sharp images and clear text.
- Tried to figure out how rare each card was by checking online and comparing them with price guides.
Finally, I tried to get an idea of what these cards might be worth. Turns out, figuring out the value of baseball cards is a whole process. Specialists look at a bunch of stuff – the condition, how rare the card is, scarcity, grading, print variations, print quality, and of course, who’s on the card. I spent a good chunk of time looking at online price guides and comparing my cards to others that had sold recently. Some of them could be worth a decent amount, while others are probably more sentimental than anything else. These cards, produced in post-World War II Japan, hold a unique place in the history of baseball collecting. I gotta say, it was a pretty fun trip down memory lane. It got me thinking about starting to collect again, maybe even focusing specifically on these old Japanese cards. They’ve got a cool history, and there’s something really satisfying about holding a piece of that history in your hand.
