Some of you might remember the autographed Jumbo Pikachu I bought a while ago:
At the time I only knew about the two silver ones, and the Torii PCL one at the bottom somewhat.
With the great help from some members here and on reddit, I now know four of the five signatures:
I don’t think he needs introduction, but just in case relatively new collectors read this: Mitsuhiro Arita is a famous Japanese Pokémon illustrator. He’s been an active illustrator for the Pokémon TCG since the beginning. The Base Pikachu is one of his illustrations, but the recent Mewtwo GX 78/73 Secret Rare from SM Shining Legends (Mewtwo in the laboratory tube) is also his illustration for example. He signs either with his English or Japanese signature, or in this case above both. (Mitsuhiro Arita autographed cards are probably one of the easiest to find, since he signs a lot of them at Pokémon events, although they are still very popular.)
Although I don’t know who Torri is, the PCL stands for Pokémon Card Laboratory. PCL employees are basically the creators of the Pokémon TCG in Japan, and they handle the R&D (Research & Development) of the Pokémon TCG. They are also in charge of designing new cards, and have authority on any matter related to the Pokémon TCG.
I did hear Torii was showing some e-reader’s he created at one of the events, although I would like to know his full name if possible.
Today I heard from someone on reddit that BDS is Richard Walkoski, a top level Pokémon TCG tournament organizer and judge, better known as Big Daddy Snorlax.
Source:
MTM and DMTM are both the same person: Mike Boozer, better known as Dark Master Trainer Mike. He was a WotC representative and was present at Pokémon events in the early WotC days. He’s also pretty well-known for spreading the rumors and pictures of the Prerelease Raichu.
Source:
So, that leaves me with the final signature left to find out. The golden one near the tail of Pikachu:
If anyone could identify it I would greatly appreciate it. I’ll see if I can make a clearer picture later this week, since it might not be too clear right now.
Thanks! Out of curiosity, did you recognize his autograph from somewhere else, or read it from the autograph? Now that you’ve said it I can see Steve in the middle part of the signature, but I can’t really distinguish Kam myself tbh. Also, do you know where the DM (or OM) at the top stands for?
Thanks for clearing the mystery of the final stamp, @jkanly! Appreciated.
That feeling you get when you realize that the other signature on your 1996 Derek Jeter-banmeno Rivera-Alfonso Soriano autographed baseball is that of the clubhouse janitor.