The name Kris Bryant may not be quite the household name yet for people who do not follow baseball prospects or the minor leagues, but it shouldn’t be long after a season in which he finished with a .325/.438/.661 slash line and a minor-league leading 43 HR’s between AA and AAA in 2014. On Thursday we learned that the consensus #1 prospect in all of baseball may also be a pretty damn good guy as well.
Last week, sports memorabilia collector Mike Kennedy found one of Bryant’s game-used bats for sale on eBay for $850. He’s a fan of Bryant, but before he was going to pay that much money for a baseball bat, he first decided to use the best resource we have at our disposal for tasks like these by reaching out to Bryant on twitter to hopefully confirm the bat’s authenticity.
But rather than simply confirming the bat’s authenticity, Bryant offered to do his fan one better.
Oh man, seriously? This is incredible. Mike, give him some details.
I will translate that tweet for you as best I can. “The bat I found on eBay is game-used [laughter]. They are expensive. I wouldn’t expect you to do that, but I appreciate it. I want one for my…personal collection? I think that’s what I’m saying. Yeah, personal collection.”
On Thursday, Kennedy received the game-used bat, which was signed by Bryant with a personalized note:
Afterwards, Kennedy wanted people to know that he wasn’t looking for a handout; he’s just a fan and collector who didn’t want to be ripped off.
“I’m just a big fan. And for me I collect cards and then started collecting game-used memorabilia. When you own a bat that was used in a game it’s a piece of history to me. So that’s why I like them. Even 30 years from now here’s this bat that was used by a player. So I just collect. I wasn’t trying to get anything from him. I just wanted to know if it was legit before I bought it. … I was blown away.”
Kris Bryant is not yet a major-leaguer, but he will be soon and he’s already given us a reason to root for him.
PHOTO: USATODAYSPORTS/Mark Rebillas
