In almost all great stories about storage auctions, someone comes close to leaving. The box almost goes into the trash, but the tin ends up in a donation pile, and history is quietly lost. This almost turned into that, and the fact that it didn’t is what makes it interesting.
Seven full boxes of 1986–1987 Fleer basketball cards were found in an Ohio storage unit earlier this year. Details are still pretty sketchy, as they often are in these situations. Not any basketball cards, these are the real deal. In that year’s Fleer set, there is what collectors consider to be the definitive rookie card of Michael Jordan. This piece of cardboard has gone from being a collector’s favorite to something that serious investors keep an eye on in the same way they keep an eye on stock prices.
Finally, the seven boxes were sold at Goldin Auctions for a total of $660,510 bucks. Six of them were sold in groups of three, and each group got $371,200. Only one box broke records when it sold for $119,310. A $922 price was paid for an empty box that used to hold the same thing. That makes you want to laugh, but it sold, so who’s laughing now?
The sales were part of a larger auction where a Mike Trout autograph went for $922,500, a LeBron James rookie patch broke six figures, and a BGS 10 graded Kobe Bryant Topps Chrome Refractor card sold for $113,160. It wasn’t really like an auction for sports memorabilia; it was more like a mid-sized art gallery getting rid of its stock before a very good season.
A big part of what’s going on is The Last Dance. Another group of people who had never seen Michael Jordan play—those who were too young or hadn’t been born yet—heard about his story through the 2020 ESPN documentary about his last championship run with the Bulls. Some of them were looking for something real to hold on to, and the hobby gave them that. The price of Jordan’s rookie card has gone up in ways that would have seemed crazy in 2018.
Around the same time in Michigan, a different but just as interesting story happened. In Kentwood, a woman walked into Legends Sports & Games with what she called “duds or diamonds.” She found the cards more than two years ago in Omaha, Nebraska, when she was cleaning out the storage unit that her late brother had left behind. She said that most of what she found was junk. But she just couldn’t throw away the small tin box that was sealed with cardboard and tape. She opened it for some reason.
There were almost 200 cards from the 1933 Goudey baseball set inside. This set is widely regarded as one of the most famous in the hobby. There are four Babe Ruth cards. There are two Lou Gehrig cards. Two Mel Ott cards. Lou Brown, the owner of the shop, thought the collection was worth more than $100,000, but some of the rare cards still needed to be graded by a professional at the time.
Brown said that it was an emotional time for the woman. She had no idea where her brother found them or how long they had been in the tin. The money on the cards she had kept in her house for two years but had mostly forgotten about could have made a big difference in her brother’s life.
There’s more to these stories than just the numbers, though it’s hard to ignore the numbers. It’s just so random. The storage unit in Ohio, the tin box in Nebraska, and the trash can accident that almost happened. Collectibles, especially old ones, tend to live on past the people who once valued them and then show up again in unexpected places and at unexpected prices. Right now, the market is loud, moves quickly, and is hard to predict.
It’s clear that the floor price for some items, like Jordan rookies, almost-complete vintage sets, and graded examples of famous cards, has gone up a lot in the last few years. No one can say for sure if that floor will stay in place. What about the people who almost threw away the box but didn’t? Everything worked out just right.
