Discover the most expensive sports memorabilia in history, auctioned for $24 million

Le maillot porté par la légende du baseball Babe Ruth date de 1932. MAXPPP – Pat Benic

Un maillot de la légende américaine du baseball Babe Ruth a pulvérisé dimanche le record de l’objet sportif le plus cher jamais vu aux enchères.

This jersey in the colors of the New York Yankees team was acquired for 24.1 million dollars, including fees and commissions, during a sale organized by the house Heritage Auctions. The online sale will have lasted several weeks. It had been a given since the end of July that the jersey of the "Bambino", one of Babe Ruth's nicknames, would take the record.

Babe Ruth's "called shot" jersey just sold for $24.2 million. pic.twitter.com/qEUP8C0YRT

— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) August 25, 2024

More expensive than a jersey worn by Michael Jordan

It dethroned a baseball card representing another Yankees player, Mickey Mantle, sold for $12.6 million in August 2022, at the end of a sale also organized by Heritage Auctions.

As for equipment worn during one or more matches, the highest mark was set, in September 2022, by the jersey worn by Michael Jordan during the first game of the NBA Finals in 1998.

El jersey que Michael Jordan usó durante las finales de 1998 en la NBA acaba de ser vendido por 10.1 millones de dólares.

Con esto, se convierte en el jersey más costoso de la historia superando al de Maradona el cual fue vendido por 9.3 millones. pic.twitter.com/IzqcRlyzds

— LIT Culture (@LITCULTUREMAG) September 17, 2022

It was sold for 10.1 million dollars at a Sotheby's sale. A sign of the rise of this market, before 2022, no sports collectible had yet exceeded the symbolic threshold of ten million dollars.

The jersey was worn in the 1930s

The jersey promised to set the record was worn by Babe Ruth (1895-1948) during a historic game against the Chicago Cubs, in the final of the World Series in 1932. Legend has it that the player pointed in the direction he wanted to send the ball, before hitting a home run, that is to say sending it out of bounds, to the place predicted.

The Yankees would go on to win the game and the final in four innings (4-0). Years after his retirement, Babe Ruth had donated the jersey to a golf partner.

Babe Ruth ‘called shot’ Yankees jersey sells for $24.12 million in record-shattering auction https://t.co/fB9vJg2s9S pic.twitter.com/E3JNPxMF1e

— New York Post (@nypost) August 25, 2024

It had already been resold three times since then, the last time, in 2005, for only $940,000.