Ever wonder if you’ve spent too much on a pair of sneakers? Maybe you told yourself they were worth it because of how good they’d look on your feet or because they were a particularly rare find. Well, with all of the fervor surrounding ESPN’s The Last Dance, mania for Michael Jordan — and his shoes — reached even bigger heights in the sneaker world. On Sunday — as the final two episodes of the acclaimed documentary aired — a signed pair of Nikes that Jordan wore during his 1984-85 rookie season was sold by Sotheby’s for $560,000, becoming the most expensive sneaker sale ever recorded.
According to CNBC, the sneakers sold for more than three times their original estimated price and beat the previous record sale established by a pair of 972 Nike Waffle Racing “Flat Moon Shoes” that went for $437,500 last summer. Famed shoe collector Jordan Michael Geller of Portland, Oregon reportedly sold both pairs of shoes, and decided that there was no better time to put the Nike Air Jordan 1’s on the market. The classic sneakers — left foot, size 13 and right, 13.5 — were in the classic Chicago Bulls colors red, white and black and signed by Jordan with a black permanent marker. The buyer’s name has not been disclosed at this time.
Nike’s Air Jordans are arguably the most iconic line of sneakers and are consistently sought after in the resale market. Of course, as the now well-known story goes, upon entering the league, a 21-year-old Jordan actually wanted to sign an endorsement deal with Adidas. However, as Jordan’s agent David Falk said in episode five of The Last Dance, “Adidas was really dysfunctional by that time. And they had just told me, ‘Look, we’d love to have Jordan, we just can’t make a shoe work at this point in time.’ I wanted Michael to go with Nike because they were the big upstart.” And so, at Falk and Jordan’s mother’s behest, the rookie took a meeting with Nike and the rest is history.
