Mickey Mantle baseball card shatters record, sells for $5.2 million

A Mickey Mantle baseball card sold for $5.2 million, crushing a 5-month-old record for highest-selling sports card of all time. 

The card, a 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle PSA 9—PSA is a grading system used for sports cards with a range from 1-10. The prior record was held by a one-of-one Mike Trout rookie card that sold for $3.94 million in August. Legend has it that there are only 6 PSA 9s of the Mantle card. 

Who purchased the card? Rob Gough, an actor who acquired the streetwear brand Dope in 2017. Gough stated, "The 1952 Topps Mantle is the holy grail of sports cards. As a kid ripping packs in the '90s, I always dreamt of owning one. . . I felt this Mantle was highly underpriced." 

Apparently, thousands of 1952 cards were dumped into the Hudson River in 1960 after overproduction. 

"Since August, Gough has amassed a 1916 Sporting News Babe Ruth rookie, a 1917 Collins-McCarthy Joe Jackson and several PSA 10 Michael Jordan rookie cards among others." 

The sale of the card is just one of many in the recent surge in big-money sports memorabilia—particularly rookie cards. 

See Dan Hajducky, Mickey Mantle baseball card shatters record, sells for $5.2 million, ESPN, January 14, 2021. 

Special thanks to David S. Luber (Florida Probate Attorney) for bringing this article to my attention.