NBA, Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls jersey sold at auction for $14 million

Fourteen million dollars. It is the amount that Ron Firman, a real estate investor from Miami, paid for the number 23 Chicago Bulls jersey that Michael Jordan wore in Game 2 of the 1998 NBA Finals and which bears his signature.

No basketball-related item had ever sold for such a high price.

The deal did not go through a public auction, but closed with a private sale managed by the American house Hunt Auctions.

To understand why that shirt is worth so much you have to go back to June 5, 1998.

The Bulls had lost Game 1 in overtime at the Utah Jazz, 88-85, and risked returning to Chicago down two games.

Jordan didn't allow it.

He finished with 37 points, his best of the night, and the Bulls won 93-88 to put the series back in balance.

Nine days later, still in Salt Lake City, Game 6 arrived: stolen ball from Karl Malone, shot on Bryon Russell 5.2 seconds from the siren, series closed at 4-2.

It was Michael Jordan's sixth and last title with the Chicago Bulls and, for the sixth time out of six, he was elected MVP of the Finals.

That season, the last of Chicago's dynasty, became the 2020 ESPN and Netflix docuseries "The Last Dance," which brought No. 23 back to a generation that had never seen him play.

The market for Jordan memorabilia has been going strong for years, but it has accelerated in recent weeks.

In 2022 Sotheby's sold the red jersey from Game 1 of the same Finals for 10.1 million dollars.

Just two weeks ago the Game 3 jersey, without an autograph, changed hands for $12.26 million on Joopiter, the auction platform founded by Pharrell Williams, with a single bid arriving before closing time.

It seemed like a record destined to last.

It fell in fifteen days.

The new price also surpasses the previous high for basketball, which belonged not to a jersey but to a 2007-08 trading card featuring Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant, which sold last year for $12.9 million.

Considering all sports, the tank top purchased by Firman stops in second place.

More expensive is only the New York Yankees jersey that Babe Ruth wore in the 1932 World Series, the one with the legendary "called shot".

According to the story that has entered baseball mythology, Ruth pointed to the stands of Wrigley Field before hitting the ball there against the Chicago Cubs.

In 2024 it sold for $24.12 million.

David Hunt, president of Hunt Auctions, sees the sale as a category change.

“Michael Jordan's clout in the sports memorabilia market was long established,” he said in a statement, “but has now moved into an elite asset class usually reserved for iconic works of art.”