Another day, another 7 figure sale for a piece of Michael Jordan memorabilia. This time it was the jacket that His Airness wore on the podium while receiving a gold medal at the 1992 Olympic games in Barcelona.
The red, white, and blue Reebok jacket fetched $1.512M at an auction facilitated by Sotheby’s recently. Aside from it being worn by Jordan, the jacket took on added significance because of its manufacturer and controversy surrounding its use.
Jordan, a Nike athlete, expressed hesitation about wearing the track suit which all of his “Dream Team” teammates would wear to receive their gold medals. Eventually the U.S. Olympic committee had to get involved and told Jordan in no uncertain terms that he had to wear it on the podium.
Begrudgingly, MJ donned the suit, but in a clever bit of manoeuvring to stay on brand, draped an American flag over his shoulder to hide the Reebok logo from cameras. After the ceremony, he quickly removed the tracksuit and gave the jacket to Brian McIntyre who was working with the American Olympic basketball team at the time.
As the story goes, McIntyre attempted to return the jacket to Jordan in 1994, but MJ instead autographed it and told his former Olympic staffer to keep it.
While initial estimates figured the piece of sports history would fetch somewhere in the range of $1-3M, the $1.512M price tag still makes it one of the most expensive pieces of Olympic memorabilia to be sold publicly in recent years.
The 1992 Dream Team, and Jordan’s standoff with Reebok was briefly discussed in the recent Bulls docuseries “The Last Dance”, renewing interest in the 31 year old item.
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