A $92 ticket stub from the game in which LeBron James broke the NBA's career scoring record has gone up for auction. LeBron broke Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's scoring record partway through a February 7, 2023 game against the Oklahoma City Thunder. At the time of writing, LeBron holds the record with 38,652 career regular-season points. The record had stood since 1989 when Abdul-Jabbar retired with 38,387 points. In the nearly 35 years since then, the only person to come close to the record before LeBron was Karl Malone. Even then, Malone, who retired in 2004, only finished with 36,928 points.
While many felt that LeBron breaking the record, given his longevity in both pure time and playing ability, was inevitable, it was still truly a historic moment. Furthermore, many figured it was only a matter of time before collectible items hit the market. Previously, Chris Ivy, the Head of Sports Auctions at Heritage Auctions, suggested that LeBron's game-worn jersey from that night could be worth as much as $3 million if it ever came to auction. However, the ticket stub appears to be the first collectible from the night. The ticket is not the most scarce item with nearly 19,000 people officially in attendance. However, it is still expected to go for several thousand dollars.
Healthy Market Expected For LeBron Ticket
The ticket, graded at Mint 9 by PSA, is being auctioned by the aforementioned Heritage Auctions. At the time of writing, bidding for the ticket sits at $2100. Furthermore, ticketing experts at Heritage told TMZ that they believed the ticket would sell for somewhere in the region of $5000. Despite the excellent quality of the ticket, the price will be suppressed by the potential abundance of other examples of ticketing from the event. By comparison, a badge from the 1997 Masters, signed by Tiger Woods, currently sits at $9000 on Hertiage's website.
But where does the LeBron ticket sit in comparison to other tickets? There are a few ways to look at this. Purely in terms of tickets alone, the most expensive auction was in March 2022. A ticket from the inaugural 1934 Masters, signed by 17 of the 61 participants, sold for $600,000. It is believed to be just one of two surviving tickets in circulation. A third is held by the Augusta National Golf Club. In terms of basketball tickets, Heritage sold a season ticket from Michael Jordan's debut for $468,000 in February 2022. While the ticket collectible market is still relatively new, scarcity is the name of the game. As mentioned, there were nearly 19,000 people inside Crypto.com Arena on the night that LeBron broke the record. With that many tickets potentially in circulation, the price will never truly skyrocket unless things drastically change.
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