Project Durham Bulls #21 - Adam Kennedy

2009 Durham Bulls 

Background-

Kennedy passed through Durham during the middle of career.  He started out with the Cardinals as a first round draft pick out of Cal State Northridge in 1997.  The Cardinals traded him to the Angels during Spring Training in 2000 for Jim Edmonds.  His career highlight came in 2002, while helping the Angels win the World Series, he hit three home runs in a game against the Twins in an American League Championship Game.  

He won the ALCS MVP that year.  Kennedy played with the Angels until 2006 when he returned to the Cardinals.  It didn't go well.  He played the 2007 and 2008 seasons in St. Louis and spent the entire time in Tony LaRussa's dog house.  The Cardinals cut him loose after the 2008 season and Kennedy ended up with the Rays who assigned him to Durham.  He last 23 games in Durham and posted a .280/.366/.439 slash line.  The A's rescued him from the Minors when they traded for him early in May of 2009.  He spent the rest of the season with the A's and actually had a decent season.  He played 3 more seasons after 2009 spending a single season with the Nationals, Mariners, and Dodgers before retiring in 2012.

Card-
I actually have a fair number of Kennedy autographs since he was a member of the Cardinals.  I am not even sure he signed much of anything after 2001 outside of a card in the 2004 UD Etchings set.  I know I have never made a post about that set, but if I did it would not be kind.  So, I was really left with trying to find a late 1990s or early 2000s card of the long time Major League second baseman.  I had thought long and hard about picking up a 2001 Topps Finest card for this post, after all those were really his best years, but the conditions of the cards were less than ideal.  If you've never checked out the autographs from that set, they fade very easily.  So, that left me to track down a Cardinals autograph that I did not own.  So, here we are with a 2000 Skybox Autographics.  It's a giant cross product 90s autograph set, but the design is nice and there were no such things as sticker autographs at this point, so.....