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Babe Ruth’s 1934 tour of Japan left behind a baseball legacy, plenty of collectibles
Los Angeles Dodgers superstar Shohei Ohtani conquered both the major leagues and the collectibles industry with his historic 50-50 season last year. The Japanese star, known by the nickname “Shotime,” capped off the 2024 season by helping the Dodgers win the World Series.
The two-way star is reminiscent of another hitter (who was also a pitcher) who once dominated baseball to become one of the 20th century’s greatest athletes. That player was Babe Ruth, who made the long ball fashionable and forever changed the game with the New York Yankees of the 1920s and ’30s.
Ohtani and Ruth are linked in other ways. While Ohtani, a three-time MVP, dominated the MLB season, Ruth did the same in Japan when he and a group of major leaguers took a barnstorming tour of the island nation in 1934.
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Ohtani, now baseball's biggest star and the first full-time two-way player since Ruth, will return to his home country on March 18-19 when the Dodgers play the Cubs in two regular season games in the MLB Tokyo Series. The 2025 season opens in the U.S. on March 27.
The tour took place amid strained political relations between the United States and Japan, taking place just seven years before the attack on Pearl Harbor. But the tour was less of a diplomatic mission and more of a publicity stunt orchestrated by the Tokyo-based daily newspaper “Yomiuri Shimbun” to attract readers.
Japan did not have a professional baseball league at the time. Newspaper owner and tour organizer Matsutaro Shoriki brought together the country’s best amateur players, branding them the All Nippon team. Like in the United States at the time, baseball was Japan’s most-popular sport. In 1931, a team of American stars featuring Lou Gehrig had toured Japan. Nonetheless, that team did not feature Ruth, the game’s greatest player.
In November 1934, the Japanese players were pitted against the All Americans—led by Ruth and made up only of American League players—as part of the 12-city, 18-game tour. In addition to Ruth and Gehrig, other notable stars included Jimmie Foxx, Charlie Gehringer, Lefty Gomez, Bill Terry, and Earle Combs.
The American players were received with incredible enthusiasm by Japanese fans. Baseball was already hugely popular in Japan, especially at the collegiate level, and the presence of some of the most famous players in the world created a sensation.
Historian and collector Rob Fitts, author of “Banzai Babe Ruth: Baseball, Espionage and Assassination during the 1934 Tour of Japan,” said Ruth was the star of the tour.
The Bambino, known for his larger-than-life personality, finished first in most categories. Ruth batted .408, hit 13 home runs and added 33 RBIs. At the same time, the All Americans won every game and outscored their opponents by a combined score of 181-36.
“Ruth led the team in home runs, RBIs and also in batting average,” Fitts said. “He was a star there.”
Ironically, “The Sultan of Swat” had been released by the Yankees just a month before the tour began.
“In a way, he had a lot to prove—and he did prove it while he was over there,” Fitts said.
By the time the tour was over, Ruth became an international celebrity. At the same time, the exhibition series led to the creation, just a year later, of a pro Japanese baseball league.
Beyond the games, the tour had broader cultural implications. It was a rare moment in which sports played a role in international relations, providing a platform for the U.S. and Japan to unite, albeit temporarily, through a shared love of baseball. Despite the tour, Japan would invade China and embark on naval supremacy of the Pacific Ocean that would culminate with World War II.
Over the years, the tour has lived on through vintage photos, signed items and even trading card sets.
Only three sets featuring the touring All Americans were produced, but only a few examples of each card has survived. The largest of these sets—known only by the catalog number “JBR48”—features 20 cards. About the size of a 1951 Bowman card, the American players—of which Ruth is one—are featured wearing their MLB uniforms.
At the same time, the tour also produced several souvenirs. In 2014, a baseball signed by Ruth, Gehrig and the entire U.S. team sold for $2,100 at SCP Auctions.
The players signed lots of baseballs during the month-long tour, but few survived.
Earlier this year, a team-signed ball from the tour—also featuring Ruth—was sold at auction by Memory Lane Inc. for nearly $31,000.
Like Ruth, Ohtani also demands high bids from collectors. Nonetheless, comparisons between the two are difficult to make.
“I still feel that Ruth was the greatest baseball player of all time because you have to judge a baseball player within the context he played in,” Fitts said. “Ruth dominated the [major] leagues for so long and was considered one of the greatest athletes of his time.”
Fitts said Ohtani is his favorite player, “but he’s not quite as dominating as Ruth was in his time period.”
Clemente Lisi
