Everything Michael Jordan touches turns to gold, even beyond his playing years. Their NASCAR team is off to a historic start, which is just one example of this.
This dynamic was evident at a recent auction, where his historic first cover on Sports Illustrated sold for a record $229,360, according to Black Enterprise’s Cedric ‘Big CED’ Thornton.
This cover is from 1983 when Jordan was at the University of North Carolina. This includes him and his Carolina teammate Sam Perkins. Ultimately, the record sale came through a Goldin auction.
The sale surpassed the previous record set by another Sports Illustrated cover featuring Jordan in 1984, which sold for $126,000 in 2023.
$229,360: Record sale of Michael Jordan’s first Sports Illustrated cover, grade 9.6 @PSAcardThrough @goldinco.
The result is the highest ever for any rated magazine and the highest for any magazine or comic held by PSA.
PSA began grading the category last July. pic.twitter.com/6CPFK7TqpU
– Ben Burrows (@BenMBurrows) 8 March 2026
Furthermore, the auction described the cover as a launch pad for everything else.
“Before Jordan’s 1984-85 Star rookie cards. Before his 1986-87 Flyer RCs. Before his “Star Is Born” debut SI cover in a Bulls uniform. Yes, before any of those iconic MJ masterpieces, when His Airness still wore Converse at UNC, there was this Sports Illustrated issue, with this “No. 1″ cover, which featured Jordan Marked the beginning of the billion-dollar business of collectibles.”
In 1983, North Carolina began the season as the No. 1-ranked team in the country. Last year, they won the NCAA Championship 63–62 over Georgetown, culminating in Jordan’s winning basket in the final seconds of the game.
Subsequently, Jordan became College Player of the Year twice in 1983 and 1984. Although he never won another national championship, Jordan left his mark on Chapel Hill.
In 1984, he declared for the NBA draft and won a gold medal at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. That year, the Bulls drafted him as the third pick in one of the most consequential drafts in NBA history.
Michael Jordan parted ways with Sports Illustrated in 1994
In 1994, Jordan was playing minor league baseball. At the time, many criticized his decision to step away from basketball at the peak of his career and try a sport he had not played since adolescence.
One of them was Sports Illustrated.
The breaking point was their March 1994 cover story titled “Bag It, Michael”, written by Steve Wolf. Essentially, Wolf said that Jordan and the Birmingham Barons were disrespecting the game.
From that moment on, Jordan never spoke to Sports Illustrated.
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