Michael Jordan’s championship sneakers sell for record $8 million at auction
CNN - Basketball legend Michael Jordan won six NBA championships during his prolific sporting career — and a set of the six sneakers he wore when clinching those titles has sold for a record-breaking $8 million at auction.
Friday’s winning bid for “The Dynasty Collection” reached $8,032,800, setting a new global auction record for game-worn sneakers, according to auction house Sotheby’s.
The set consisted of Air Jordan VI (1991), Air Jordan VII (1992), Air Jordan VIII (1993), Air Jordan XI (1996), Air Jordan XII (1997), and Air Jordan XIV (1998).
“This set represents the most valuable and significant collection of Air Jordan sneakers ever brought to market,” the auction house said on its website ahead of the auction.
Notably, only one of each pair was sold.
Before the 1991 NBA Finals, Tim Halland, executive director of PR for the Chicago Bulls, requested that Jordan give him one of his game-worn Air Jordan trainers if the team were victorious. Jordan, having won, fulfilled this request, signing and inscribing the shoe before gifting it to Halland – and, due to superstition, continued this tradition for the other five championships, according to Sotheby’s, who obtained the sneakers from a Private American Collector that had obtained them from Halland.
The auction lot included a set of signed limited photographs depicting a smiling Jordan wearing just one sneaker following the triumphant NBA Finals.