{"id":2017172,"date":"2026-06-29T12:32:22","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T09:32:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2017172"},"modified":"2026-06-29T12:32:22","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T09:32:22","slug":"key-shohei-ohtani-lebron-james-rookie-cards-sell-for-more-than-2-5-million-each","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2017172","title":{"rendered":"Key Shohei Ohtani, LeBron James rookie cards sell for more than $2.5 million each"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Two of the most valuable rookie cards for Shohei Ohtani<\/a> and LeBron James<\/a> sold through Goldin Auctions on Sunday night, as money continues to flood into the sports card market.<\/p>\n

Ohtani\u2019s 2018 Topps Chrome #150<\/a> SuperFractor, the one-of-a-kind parallel of one of his top rookie cards, sold for $2.56 million<\/a>, including the buyer\u2019s premium. This exact card last sold in 2022 for $139,200. It is now the second-highest publicly known sale of an Ohtani trading card behind his one-of-one 2025 Topps Chrome Gold MLB Logoman patch autographed card, which sold for $3 million<\/a> in December. That card featured one of the special gold MLB logo jersey patches Ohtani wore in a game to commemorate his 2024 MVP season.<\/p>\n

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The 2018 Topps Chrome SuperFractor that sold Sunday night marks the first ever publicly known sale of an Ohtani card that is neither autographed nor contains a game-used patch for more than $1 million.<\/p>\n

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{“endpoint”:”https:\/\/api-prd-nyt.theathletic.com\/graphql”}<\/p>\n

Ohtani cards<\/a> have skyrocketed in value as he continues to add accolades to his already historic career. According to GemRate, which tracks trading card grading and sales data, $68.8 million<\/a> was spent on individual Ohtani cards from January through May of this year on eBay alone, more than any other athlete. Michael Jordan was second on the list with $52 million in total eBay sales, and the next highest baseball players, Aaron Judge and Mickey Mantle, are even further back at $13.7 million and $13.2 million, respectively.<\/p>\n

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\"Ohtani<\/p>\n
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\n The Shohei Ohtani 2018 Topps Chrome SuperFractor (left) and LeBron James 2003-04 Exquisite Collection cards each sold for more than $2.5 million on Sunday. (Photos courtesy of Goldin)<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Eclipsing the Ohtani SuperFractor, however, was the LeBron James 2003-04 Upper Deck Exquisite Collection rookie patch autographed card numbered 9 of 23 produced, which sold for $2.93 million.<\/a> That\u2019s a new record for a James card sold at auction (there have been four known higher sales, according to trading card sales database CardLadder, but those were all privately negotiated deals). James\u2019 patch autographed cards from 2003-04 Exquisite Collection are among his most coveted high-end rookie cards.<\/p>\n

According to CardLadder, there have now been 21 known sports card sales of $1 million or more through the first six months of 2026. There were 29 in total last year.<\/p>\n

Another notable sale in the same auction was \u201cthe holy grail of graded magazines\u201d: A newsstand copy of the June 18, 1956 issue of Sports Illustrated<\/a>, which featured Mantle for the first time, graded a PSA 9.6 (on a scale to 10) that sold for $328,180<\/a>, a new record for a magazine. That record was previously held by a copy of the Nov. 28, 1983 issue of Sports Illustrated, which featured Michael Jordan for the first time and sold for $229,360<\/a> in March.<\/p>\n

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The Athletic maintains full editorial independence in all our coverage. When you click or make purchases through our links, we may earn a commission.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Two of the most valuable rookie cards for Shohei Ohtani and LeBron James sold through Goldin Auctions on Sunday night, as money continues to flood into the sports card market. Ohtani\u2019s 2018 Topps Chrome #150 SuperFractor, the one-of-a-kind parallel of one of his top rookie cards, sold for $2.56 million, including the buyer\u2019s premium. This […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[226,241],"class_list":["post-2017172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-crawlmanager","tag-nytimes-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2017172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2017172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2017172\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2017172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2017172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2017172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}