NEW YORK (AP) — A collection of sneakers that superstar Michael Jordan wore as he and the Chicago Bulls won six NBA championships has fetched $8 million at auction, setting a new record for game-worn sneakers, Sotheby’s said.
The six Air Jordan shoes — one apiece from the last games of the 1991, 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997 and 1998 championship series — sold Friday.
Sotheby’s dubbed it the “Dynasty Collection.”
“Serving as both a reminder of Michael Jordan’s lasting impact on the world and a tangible expression of his recognized legendary status, its significance is further validated by this monumental result,” Brahm Wachter of Sotheby’s said in a statement.
“Individually, each of these six game-worn championship-clinching sneakers worn by Michael Jordan is directly linked to some of the most memorable and significant points in his illustrious career,” Wachter told the Sun-Times ahead of the sale. “To unite them into one collection is nothing short of magical.”
The auction lot included iconic photos of Jordan wearing a single shoe as he celebrated the 1992, 1993, 1996 and 1998 wins. That’s because Tim Hallam, a public relations executive with the Bulls, asked Jordan for one of his game-worn shoes before the 1991 NBA Finals if the Bulls won the title.
Jordan agreed to sign a shoe and part ways with it, then proceeded to do the same after subsequent championships, Sotheby’s said.
Sotheby’s didn’t identify the buyer and described the seller only as “a private American collector” who obtained them from a longtime Bulls executive.
A five-time league MVP and two-time Olympic gold medalist, Jordan was so singular a player that then-NBA Commissioner David Stern in 1992 called him “the standard by which basketball excellence is measured.”
The NBA renamed its MVP trophy for Jordan in 2022.
He also helped shake up the athletic shoe industry and supercharge sneaker culture by teaming up with Nike to create Air Jordans in the mid-1980s. The pair he wore in the second game of the 1998 NBA Finals was sold through Sotheby’s last April for $2.2 million, a record for a pair of sneakers.
The highest auction price for any Jordan memorabilia was $10.1 million for his jersey from the first game at that series, according to Sotheby’s, which sold it in 2022.
Simply an unused ticket to Jordan’s 1984 debut with the Bulls was sold through Heritage Auctions in 2022 for $468,000 — over 55,000 times the face value.
Contributing: Kade Heather
