High Supply, Higher Demand: 1986 Fleer Michael Jordan Rookie Card Keeps Its Value

As the hobby continues to flourish and the average participant becomes more educated, certain market outliers start to feel puzzling. Few fit that description more than the iconic 1986 Fleer Michael Jordan card that we’re all too familiar with. If the market is truly governed by supply and demand, how does a card with nearly 50,000 graded copies in circulation still sell for thousands of dollars, even in its lowest grades? More importantly, how has this card managed not only to hold its value, but to continue increasing over time?

📈 SALE SPOTLIGHT: Featuring a 1986 Fleer #57 Michael Jordan; graded PSA 8 (POP 9,050); sold for $7,900 via Fanatics Collect on May 8th! pic.twitter.com/RcouVJ5Vyh
— Cardhedger (@cardhedger) May 9, 2025

The answer is simple. While it’s true that supply and demand ultimately drive value, they're not equal. Demand matters more than supply. In this case, you’d be hard pressed to find a card with more demand than the 1986 Fleer Michael Jordan card. It carries the nostalgia of the 1980s, it’s the mainstream rookie card of a player many consider to be the greatest of all time, and it's become an icon within the hobby. In fact, it's reached the point where most kids entering the hobby today don’t even have to blink twice to recognize exactly what they’re looking at.

eBay’s highest priced card sold this last week was the legendary 1986 Fleer Michael Jordan rookie PSA 9!

A cool $28,350! Are the Jordan’s beginning to trend upwards again? pic.twitter.com/JmsOEbyY6g
— THE Pittsburgh Pete (@VintageHobbyGuy) December 28, 2025

Now it’s true, the 1986 Fleer Michael Jordan card did see a decline much like nearly every other card after the market corrected itself from the bubble created during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, by and large, the card has continued its trend back upward and appears to be as popular as ever. Below is a chart from Card Ladder, a popular platform for tracking trading card values, illustrating its value over the years.

1986 Fleer Michael Jordan Card Index — https://app.cardladder.com/indexes

The obvious question hobbyists continue to speculate on is whether this card’s value can be sustained for years to come, and a case can be made for either outcome. On the one hand, as time passes and kids who are further removed from the Michael Jordan era enter the hobby without much appreciation for that time, it’s reasonable to suspect that interest could eventually fade. On the other hand, more people continue to join the hobby every year, and many of them are learning fairly quickly just how iconic this card is. The idea that a card with this level of stature simply falls off feels unlikely. That said, with a population nearing 50,000, does it really take that much of a drop in interest for the card to start feeling real pressure from a value standpoint? Only time will tell.