Historic souvenirs caught by fans, limited-edition cards, game-worn jerseys -- all three make sense in shaping the seemingly never-ending boom that is sports memorabilia sales.
How about a scorecard documenting Michael Jordan's 20,000th career point? Seems like a bit of a stretch? Well it ain't. In a year of record-setting sales for sport collector items, the piece of paper marking Jordan's introduction to the NBA's 20,000-point club is now being auctioned off.
How much the paper nets remains to be seen but the buyer will be getting more than just a statistical breakdown of the historic 1993 game between the Chicago Bulls and the Milwaukee Bucks. In addition to the game’s complete stats, the scorecard prominently features the number 20,000 in blue ink followed by Jordan’s signature below.
The paper, which belongs to Bulls play-by-play announcer Neil Funk, showcases a 120-95 Bulls’ win, paced by Jordan’s 35 points. The celebrations for the home crowd began as early as the second quarter when Jordan knocked down a 3-pointer to eclipse the scoring benchmark.
The Bulls went on to win their third consecutive NBA championship in 1993, before Jordan shocked the league by announcing his retirement in October at the age of 30. He famously unretired after a brief hiatus in baseball and led Chicago on another three-year championship tear.
Jordan’s 32,292 career points are good for fifth on the all-time leading scorers list.
The auction -- overseen by Lelands -- is open until Saturday, Dec. 10. It comes at the end of a year that’s seen multiple record-breaking sports sales, including Jordan’s jersey worn in Game 1 of the 1998 NBA Finals, known around the league as “The Last Dance.” At $10.1 million, it is the most expensive piece of game-worn sports memorabilia sold at auction.
NBA
The only sports memorabilia item that went for more was a 1952 Mickey Mantle trading card that sold for $12.6 million in August, less than two months before Jordan’s jersey fetched an eight-figure price tag. Some other major sales of 2022 include the 1986 Argentina jersey worn by Diego Maradona when he scored the “Hand of God” which went for just under $9.28 million and a Luka Doncic Rookie Logoman jersey that went for $3.12 million.
While not expected to fetch the same multi-million-dollar haul, the scorecard is certainly a fun collector’s item for one lucky bidder.