A copy of Michael Jordan’s 1983 "Sports Illustrated" cover debut sold for $229,360 on Saturday night at Goldin, obliterating the previous record for a graded magazine.
Before Saturday, the previous record was the $126,000 paid for Jordan’s 1984 SI debut in a Bulls uniform entitled “A Star Is Born.”
"Sports Illustrated" magazines are very common and people kept them, but collectors narrowed the category by making rarer newsstand copies most collectible, and graded condition of those copies to narrow the most desirable down further.
Then, in July, came PSA to challenge CGC in the grading space.
The record UNC Jordan, with teammate Sam Perkins on the cover, was the only PSA 9.6. The question is, with PSA’s grading just beginning, are there others our there?
It’s possible, but that Jordan issue presents a challenge because it has a gatefold that makes it more challenging to press out defects.
The big price will likely create a group of opportunists who will now take raw subscription copies of this issue and get them graded for potential arbitrage.
But it won’t be that easy. A CGC 8.0 newsstand edition sold for $4,636 in October.
Whether the big price also creates more grading and selling of rare magazines remains to be seen, but PSA’s entrance into the space has definitely turned heads.
PSA has graded more than 50 of this particular issue, the second most commonly graded after the “Star is Born” issue.
Darren Rovell is the founder of cllct and one of the country's leading reporters on the collectibles market. He previously worked for ESPN, CNBC and The Action Network.