Michael Jordan PMG Basketball Card Sells for Record Sports Card Dollar Amount!!

The PMG Jordan is a Holy Grail for modern day basketball cards. PHOTO BY DAVID SEIDEMAN Forbes.com

A 1997-98 Skybox Metal Universe Precious Metal Gems (PMG) Michael Jordan card just sold for $350,100 on eBay, smashing numerous records.

“It’s the most ever bid for a single Jordan card at public auction, and the third most expensive basketball card ever sold,” notes Rich Mueller, editor of Sports Collectors Daily.

The Jordan also set a new record for the most expensive basketball card sold on eBay and for a modern (post 90’s) basketball card ever sold.

Above all, these new records suggest that trading cards have become an alternative blue chip investment and a liquid, tangible asset for high-rollers. And the records demonstrate Jordan’s enduring popularity.

PWCC, the largest sports card seller on eBay, restricted bidding to pre-approved buyers. There were still 130 frenzied bids, with predictable “sniping,” or last-second bidding.

In 1997-98, Skybox produced a 123-card metal baseball insert issue in addition to its base set.  The first ten of each the 100 serially printed cards had an emerald green background. One of them featured Michael Jordan.

Experts hail it as a “mythical” card and a modern Holy Grail.

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The PMG’s back  was state of the art.PHOTO BY PWCC

Its origins are humble. “Boxes of 1997-98 Metal Universe basketball originally retailed for $2.49 per pack with 24 packs per box,” Mueller said.

On a Facebook sports card forum, Danny Mac, who managed a sports card shop in 1998-2000, recalled a green Jordan selling for $200.

The last sale was in 2015 for a “small six-figure sum.” That means the card has more than tripled in value over the past four years.

PSA labeled both of the last copies “Authentic,” with no number assigned. The latest suffered from irregular wear to the right edge. One can only imagine what a mid or high-grade green Jordan would now command.

On a basketball card Facebook forum, Richard Starr wrote:

I was at the National [Sports Collectors Convention] in Anaheim many, many years ago and a Japanese man had a case full of the green cards on display, but he was not selling, he was buying.

When you have a small group of wealthy people who really, really, want something, the market shifts. I ‘knew’ these cards would be big one day, but it happened many, many years after I gave up waiting.

Jordan’s global brand appeals to collectors and investors alike. According to eBay’s own research, over the past seven weeks of this basketball season “he accounted for 42% of NBA sales on eBay, beating out some of the game’s hottest current players like LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Stephen Curry and past icons like Shaquille O’Neal and Magic Johnson.”

The eBay research also reveals that combining James’s sales with Jordan’s accounts for 64% of all basketball trading card sales on eBay, proving that those two are revered as kings of the court.

All five green PMGs in PWCC’s auction. The Tim Duncan sold for $34,000. PHOTO BY PWCC.

David SeidemanSenior Contributor