23 Sports Collectibles That Scored Big at Auction

Yes, you can be really mad at your mother if she threw out your baseball cards, especially since a Honus Wagner card sold for $3.12 million in 2016 through Goldin Auctions. Sports — especially when it comes to memorabilia — isn’t just about the game. Here are some auction results that may have you looking at your keepsakes in a whole new light.

Sold for: $3.12 million
Year: 2016
The famed “Jumbo” T206 Honus Wagner baseball card from 1909-11 — in premium condition, of course — set a record when it sold for $3.12 million(yes, million) back in October of 2016. Sold by Goldin Auctions, it was produced by the American Tobacco Company in a limited release. Bet the famed shortstop could never have imagined such a legacy.

Sold for: $4.4 million
Year: 2012
A game-worn “road” New York Yankees jersey worn by Babe Ruth, known as both “the Bambino” and “The Sultan of Swat” for his hitting prowess, was sold for $4.4 million back in 2012, setting a record for any item of sports memorabilia at auction — a feat notched by SCP Auctions.

Sold for: $2.1 million
Year: 2017
Of course, Ruth memorabilia is legendary — and often brings impressive results. Back in 2017, as reported by Forbes, Hollywood bad boy Charlie Sheen put his Babe Ruth 1927 World Series ring up for auction — and scored $2.1 million. Reportedly not sold for financial reasons, it could not have hurt to add that money to his pocket.

Sold for: $1.68 million
Year: 2017
Also reported by Forbes, 2017 saw the $1.68 million score of a newly discovered version of Norman Rockwell’s “Tough Call.” The print hung for years in the Texas home of the Sprinkle family — proudly by the granddaughter of one of the depicted umpires — until it was found to be Rockwell’s actual study for the often-reproduced work and was even signed and inscribed, making it a real treasure.

As reported by CNN back in 1999, Mark McGwire’s 70th home run baseball — a piece of baseball history marking the St. Louis Cardinals slugger’s 1998 feat — sold at auction, by Guernsey’s, for just over $3 million ($2.7 million plus a $305,000 commission).

Sold for:$4.3 million
Year:2010
In 2010, Kansas University graduate David Booth wanted the original rules of basketball to be at home on the campus — sohe paid $4.3 million through an auction at Sotheby’s in New York to ensure it would find a new home there. Turns out Naismith founded the college’s basketball program.

Sold for: $190,373
Year:2017
In 2017, ABC News reported that a pair of Michael Jordan’s shoes sold at auction for what was the highest price on record for a pair of game-used sneakers — $190,373. Said to have been used in the gold-medal game against Spain in the 1984 Olympics, the shoes of the former Chicago Bulls and Washington Wizards NBA star were sold by SCP Auctions.

Sold for: $1 million
Year: 2018
Goldin Auctions’ 2018 October Legends Auction rang up $4.6 million in sales — led by $1 million culled from the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Collection. Among the NBA treasures from the legend born Lew Alcindor was his 1970-71 Milwaukee Bucks championship ring that brought in $153,437, as reported by Sports Collectors Digest.

Sold for:$1.275 million
Year: 2010
Okay, we’re with you if you had to say “Paul who?” — but as reported by the CBC, this Canadian national hero’s jersey — worn in a historic hockey series against Russia at the height of the Cold War — fetched $1.275 million making it quite the score.

Sold for: $465,000
Year:2016
Okay, now you gotta know who “The Great One” is, right? Well, in 2016, Sports Illustrated reported that hockey legend Gretzky’s rookie card from 1979 sold for $465,000 at a Goldin Auctions event held as part of the National Sports Collection Convention in Atlantic City, New Jersey. It was a record-setting fee for a hockey trading card.

Sold for: $1.1 million
Year: 2012
In 2012, Business Insider reported that the boxing gloves worn by iconic fighter Muhammad Ali in the legendary 1965 battle with Floyd Patterson brought in $1.1 million.

Sold for: $435,763
Year:2018
Sometimes a piece of memorabilia offers a glimpse into the early days of an athlete. As featured by 247Sports, the 1987 Heisman Trophy captured by former Notre Dame and NFL Hall of Famer Tim Brown, wide receiver, brought in $435,763 for Goldin Auctions at the end of 2018. The personal letter of authenticity from the wide receiver must have helped set the record price.

Sold for: $50,131
Year:2017
Vince Lombardi, the legendary coach who won six NFL championships (1956-1967) — and the first two Super Bowls — earned his first championship with the 1956 New York Giants, as offensive coordinator. The ring commemorating that feat sold for $50,131 in 2017, according to GiantsWire.

Sold for: $40,250
Year:2012
The British leg of tennis’s Grand Slam has its share of fans — as a glance in the stands often yields sightings of royalty and celebrity alike. One fan was prompted to pay, JustCollecting.com reports, the equivalent of $40,250 — through Christie’s in 2012 — for the unabashedly artistic 1933 tourney poster designed by noted British printmaker Sybil Andrews.

Sold for: $125,000
Year:2017
Billie Jean King vs. Bobby Riggs — oh, what a battle that was. The racquet used by King in the 1973 match was sold at auction for $125,000 — believed to be the highest price ever paid for a single piece of women’s sports memorabilia, asreported by Sports Collectors Daily. The memorabilia from the televised pop-culture event was featured in Bonham’s “Voices of the 20th Century” auction in New York in 2017.

Sold for:$1.4 million
Year:2013
Jesse Owens, the standout American sprinter, famously earned four gold medals at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. The one he gave to entertainer Bill “Bojangles” Robinson came up for sale in 2013, with SCP Auctions accepting 30 bids from across the globe. ESPN.com reported that California investor Ron Burkle, a co-owner of the NHL’s Pittsburgh Penguins, made the top offer and acquired the medal for $1,466,574.

Sold for: $19,120
Year: 2011
It’s the story behind an item, often, that gives it value. An otherwise worthless swim cap, a piece of rubber, found itself in the auction spotlight in 2011. The cap that phenom Michael Phelps — the most decorated athlete in Olympic history — wore while winning his eighth gold medal at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing sold for $19,120, according to ESPN.com.

Sold for:$865,000
Year: 2012
The first modern Olympics (1896) were highlighted by the marathon, which directly echoed the history of the Athens Games. Spyros Louis of Greece won the silver cup — the only event to have a trophy instead of medals. His grandson, ESPN.com reports, would sell the cup at a Christie’s auction in London in 2012. A Greek foundation paid the equivalent of $865,000 dollars at the time, and it would go on to be exhibited at several locations before finding a home at Stavros Niarchos Foundation Cultural Center in Greece.

Golf memorabilia may not often be in the spotlight — but a certain trophy certainly caught our eye, perhaps for its aesthetics as anything else. Green Jacket Auctions sold Walter Travis’ 1899 Nassau Country Club Cranberry Glass and Sterling Silver Trophy for $18,574.80 in December of last year. (And if you care, Travis was an Australian-born American amateur golfer who was also a noted golf journalist, innovator, teacher, and golf course architect).

Guinness World Records reports that the most valuable piece of cricket history is Australian cricketer Sir Donald Bradman’s 1948 cap, which the legendary player wore on a tour of England. In June 2003, Tim Serisier, a “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?” winner, bought the cap in a pre-auction deal with Ludgrove’s auctioneers from Bradman’s godson for the equivalent of $283,000.

Guinness World Records also reports that the most valuable piece of football history — that’s soccer for Americans — is an original FA Cup, one of the four produced for the inaugural year of the famed competition. It sold for the equivalent of $773,136 through Christie’s in the U.K. in May of 2005.

Old Cars Weekly reported that a 1952 Hudson Hornet, which was “raced to success” in NASCAR by Herb Thomas, sold for $1.265 million last August at Worldwide Auctioneers’ sale of the Hostetler Hudson Museum Collection.

This past autumn, memorabilia of Penny Chenery, owner of Secretariat, was in the spotlight. In a record-setting sale of her 1973 ticket stub and personal Kentucky Derby program — when Secretariat began its historic capture of horse racing’s Triple Crown — was sold by Lelands for $11,687. The sale, according to Sports Collectors Daily, was said to be the most ever for a modern horse-racing program.