The earliest pair of NBA game-worn Michael Jordan sneakers to ever go up for auction sold for an impressive $71,553 on Saturday.
The pair was worn by Jordan during his rookie season, when he split time between wearing the Air Jordan 1 and the Nike Air Ship. The shoe that sold on Saturday was of the Air Ship variety and they were worn by MJ for the Bulls game against the Lakers on December 2nd, 1984.
While it was initially estimated that the shoes could have fetched north of $50,000, the whopping $71,553 final bid made these Air Ships the second-most expensive pair of Michael Jordan game-worn shoes ever. The most expensive pair of Jordan game-worn shoes are the Air Jordan 12s that Jordan wore for the famous “Flu Game” during the 1997 Finals. Those sold for $104,765 in 2013.
Still, the $71,553 is not a bad haul for a guy who got the shoes as a Lakers ball boy thirty years ago.
The shoes were consigned to the auction house by Khalid Ali, who was a ball boy for the Los Angeles Lakers for the 1984-85 season. Ali originally asked Jordan for the shoes that were on his feet during warm-ups that night at the Great Western Forum — red, black and white Air Jordans. Jordan, Ali said, switched into the Air Ships for the game, signed those and gave that pair to him instead.
Ali told ESPN.com before the auction that he didn’t spend much time looking at or showing the shoes, which stayed in his mother’s closet.
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