Buying Michael Jordan 1984-1986 Star Cards

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Last Updated On: June 10th, 2023

Michael Jordan Rookie Cards are soaring in popularity, and of course value.

Clearly I underestimated the enormous demand for the 1986 Michael Jordan Fleer Rookie Sticker now that we’ve seen it increase in price 10-fold. I labeled it a Strong Buy in March of 2020, but little did I know what was about to happen.

A PSA 9 grade 1986 Michael Jordan Fleer Rookie Sticker was going for under $2,000 early 2020, and is consistently pricing over $25,000 in January of 2021.

The soaring demand for Michael Jordan’s higher grade rookie cards has undoubtedly caused a spillover effect to his lower grade Fleer rookie #57 and Fleer Sticker rookie #8 cards (e.g. PSA 6, 7, 8, and BGS 6, 7, 8, etc.). The value of the 1986 Fleer Michael Jordan card market is astounding.

But what hasn’t happened quite yet, is the Star Company cards have not increased as much and still present a buying opportunity right now. That said, I’m no financial advisor and please do your own homework; my feel for the market should not be considered investment advice!

The Star Company didn’t last many years, with a majority of their print runs containing MJ cards hitting the market between 1984 and 1986. If you read into their brief history, you’ll note that there were very limited quantities of each card printed, and an unorthodox product market launch made it more difficult to get your hands on the cards.

This is good.

The market has vastly under-appreciated the Star branded cards for decades. The exception being the 1984 Extended Rookie Card (XRC) Star #101, which is still widely considered a ‘true’ Jordan rookie even though it remains very undervalued.

My goal with this post is to highlight the cheaper Star Jordan cards that can be bought today, looking forward to further price appreciation that we’ll take advantage of in the coming years. By cheap, I actually mean in the $1,000 to $2,000 range (not all that affordable, I know).

You may be wondering why we think the market will magically start to care about these Star cards. It’s super simple: every collector, investor, or card flipper wants a piece of the hottest cards and the hottest players.

Once the hottest cards get too pricey for the everyday buyer, buyers will naturally move down market for the lower grade cards, more affordable rookies, 2nd year or 3rd year cards, and beyond. I literally recommend buying cards with this approach in mind. Rinse and repeat.

With that out of the way, the next thing to do is research which cards have a limited supply, relatively low price tag, and just start buying hand over fist, Without further ado, this is the list of 1984, 1985, and 1986 Michael Jordan Star cards. Note: The 1985 Star Gatorade Slam Dunk Michael Jordan didn’t make this list, but it gets an honorable mention.

As you can see by the list above, these MJ cards all have a super low total population. Looking at the BGS 9 MINT counts, they are ridiculously limited in supply. BGS 9.5 GEM MINT graded ones go for around $2,000-$4,000 range, so our focus will be to bid on BGS 8, BGS 8.5, and BGS 9 cards as they hit the market.

Here are a few examples of recently ended 1986 Star cards on eBay that I feel are right in the sweet spot of a good value (keep in mind I’m no financial advisor and that this is just my personal opinion – do your homework when buying!).

Leave a comment below if you pick up any of these Star cards for a fair price. Happy buying!