Gray Whale Harpooned: 2013 Topps Supreme Munenori Kawasaki

I recently was able to land a Gray Whale of mine (h/t Cervin' Torren' Up Cards), a card that I wanted but could never really justify at the prevailing asking price. The card in question is any version of the 2013 Topps Supreme Munenori Kawasaki autograph. They are up on eBay all the time, it seems like, but either the bidding always $10-15 more than I feel like spending on one or it just comes around at a bad time for me financially.

Well, events converged for me and one of the Sepia # / 35 copies popped up with a Buy It Now price a little less than the # / 50 ones usually go. I hit the button after a couple hours of thinking about it and worrying that someone else might purchase it before I made the decision to do so. I was also able to use my eBay Bucks certificate from last quarter to bring the price down quite a bit more. It's a very nice card, and I am pretty happy with it. It is a sticker autograph, but the signature is all on the sticker and the sticker is framed fairly well and applied pretty evenly. Last year I was able to add a Munenori Kawasaki relic card to my collection (make sure to read the funny anecdote shared by Zippy Zappy in the comments section), and now I've got an autograph to go with it. This one is numbered # 18 / 35.

He has seen some action this year for the Blue Jays, coming into games mostly in the 7th or 8th innings and getting 17 plate attempts over the course of 12 games during May and June. The rest of the season has been spent in AAA. He's a pretty popular player in spite of his pedestrian numbers, and I would imagine that is why he gets as much run and attention as he does. Pretty much every video clip you see of the guy is entertaining, and you can tell he enjoys life. I hope he is able to hang on for a couple more years and get a few more cards out there with his picture on them.