Kobe Bryant’s NBA championship ring from the 2000 season with the Los Angeles Lakers sold for $927,000 including buyer’s premium over the weekend.
The ring, which was gifted by Kobe to his father Joe Bryant, saw a flurry of action, with 43 total bids at Goldin auction as multiple deep pocketed buyers vied for the piece of Lakers lore. When all was said and done, the final sale price set a new record for any NBA championship ring on the secondary market.
The previous record holder was Bill Russell’s 1957 championship ring with the Boston Celtics which fetched $705K at auction back in 2021.
The sale marks the 2nd time the ring has been sold for 6 figures at auction. Back in 2013, Pam and Joe Bryant sold the title ring for $173,000. The buyer then held onto it for the past 11 years, before re-selling it along with a letter of authenticity from the Bryants.
While the sum is a new record for the world of basketball memorabilia, it still falls well short of the all-time sale price for a championship ring across all sports. That distinction still belongs to Babe Ruth’s 1927 World Series ring which was originally purchased by actor Charlie Sheen back in 1994, and then sold to an anonymous bidder in 2017 for $2,093,927.
Photo: Erik Drost. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.