Karl-Anthony Towns has racked up achievements during his decorated basketball career: He was the No. 1 overall Draft pick in 2015, he won Rookie of the Year, he’s been All-NBA three times and is in the conversation as one of the best-shooting big men of all time.
But all that is for his day job, and everyone needs hobbies. It turns out the 7-foot Knicks star is also a major presence in the trading card game -- even his birthday cake was on brand -- who recently had a pull any collector would dream of.
Towns, who often posts video of himself ripping packs on his YouTube channel and his Bigbodegacards Instagram account, was floored back in September to pull a 1-of-1 MLB Logoman card of Yoshinobu Yamamoto out of a Topps Inception box. And of course, the Dodgers ace proceeded to raise his profile and presumably the card’s value by winning World Series Most Valuable Player.
(Towns’ reaction, by the way, is fantastic: “This luck is the greatest!” And he’s not wrong, the 1-of-1 was not even the only Yamamoto autograph card he’s pulled recently. Even his girlfriend, Jordyn Woods, appears to have a magic touch.)
Towns, who pitched a bit growing up in New Jersey and estimates he can crank it up to about 85 mph, happens to be a dedicated Yankees fan. As such, he decided to give the Logoman card a new home via an auction on Fanatics Collect, where it went for $72,000 – the highest price for a Yamamoto card to date.
Will KAT use the found cash to chase more super-duper-rare baseball cards? Will his insane run of luck continue? Can he spare some for us? We’ll definitely be refreshing his socials to find out ...