I have very few card collections given my limited resources and space, but I did decide some time ago to begin collecting on-card Royals autographs. It’s been a blast so far trying to track these things down and this is the latest addition to my collection. To view the cards currently in the collection, take a look at the Gallery or the other posts in this series. I’m working on getting a legit want list together on my trade page but, in the meantime, if you have any on-card Royals autos that it looks like I don’t have, don’t hesitate to drop me a line!
Spring Training is nearing and that means two things:
1. I can start caring about sports again in about a month and a half.
2. It’s time to take a look at my slowly-completing Billy Butler RC auto collection to help get me jazzed about the upcoming year!
We start simply: His most popular rookie auto. 2005 Bowman Chrome. Simple, elegant. And with blue highlights that perfectly match the Royals blue. Black border. Chromey. Hard to top this guy. The only thing that would make this card better was if he had actually played a game in that uniform when this card was released. If you’ve been reading for a while, you know I have a grudge against Major League Baseball Cards of players who have not played a Major League Baseball Game. Oh, and I guess it would help if it didn’t look like he tried to sign this with his left hand.
Color-wise, an almost polar opposite: the 2005 Topps Chrome RC auto. Gold highlights and white border. I actually prefer this photo and the signature is slightly better on this one. Less popular because it’s not Bowman, but since this is the year before the new RC rules (that don’t mean anything, really) went into place, Topps got to make this card in its chrome set. RC auto overload: A Topps Favorite Since 2001!
Oh look. Someone spring and got himself the refractor version of the Topps RC auto. It’s awesomeness increases 1X for each color of the rainbow you can identify in this scan. I should develop a scale for determining the greatness of a card like the scale in the poetry book in Dead Poets Society. That always seemed patently ridiculous to me. Bonus points on this one for having an almost okay signature.
I have mentioned this several times before, but the fact that some wrist had to hand-write the numbers on these is hilarious to me. Why they had someone write on only the highest numbered cards I will never know. 2005 Topps Finest, you so crazy! I feel like Billy’s signature is coming into its own here.
Ah, no it’s not. I hate his signature almost as much as I hate that 2005 Topps Finest has refractor and x-fractor versions for every version of the card. What a pain in the Fine-ass.
I don’t have this card in front of me, but I’m pretty sure it’s the x-fractor blue version. It’s numbered to something. I think he signed this on the bus to Cleveland.
Believe it or not, I have tons more 2005 Billy Butler autographs to go to complete my collection. Since I stupidly set my numbering limits to /50 instead of /51, I’ll have to get the gold refractors of all of these which currently sell for over $300. Lord knows that’s well out of my budget. Ultimately, he’ll have to get way worse at what he does or I’ll have to get way better at what I do in order to afford them.
But let’s not focus on the negative! Spring Training is coming! Only a little over a month until my two teams begin… rebuilding years. Again. Ugh. Designed to break your heart, indeed.
Awesome. I collected Billy Butler for a while before his prices started to go up. The finest autos were my favorite. I’d love to see what else you have.
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Believe it or not, I’m nearing completion of all Billy Butler on-card autos. Of course, the gold refractor RCs may have to wait… Check the link at the top of the post for my whole Royals collection Photobucket or click Bill’s name in the tags for everything I’ve got!