Talk about a slick find.
According to a piece by USA Today’s Bob Nightengale, professional actor and stuntman Tony Todd, who famously did stunts for “Black Panther,” recently stumbled upon an old relic in the trunk of his car: an autographed baseball bat that Michael Jordan gifted Todd at a charity event while Jordan was playing in the Arizona Fall League in 1994.
Do the math there. Twenty-six years elapsed between Todd receiving the bat — per Nightengale, a “Louisville Slugger, model C-271, 34 inches, 32 ounces” — and digging it back up in 2020.
Not coincidentally, Todd circling back to the bat reportedly coincided with the release of “The Last Dance,” when Jordan’s foray into the White Sox’ farm system to chase his MLB dreams was well-documented.
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Apparently, a fan message sparked Todd’s search, which ended in him cracking the trunk of his old 1966 Pontiac LeMans and finding the treasure.
A bit of franticness in that search would be understandable. That’s a heck of a piece of memorabilia to forget about, especially given how in demand Jordan trinkets remain to this day. Just last month, a pair of Air Jordan 1s sold for a whopping $615,000, one of myriad examples of nostalgic auction sales booming in his name.
Imagine what a signed, little-known artifact like this could fetch.
In that vein, Todd told Nightengale he’s putting the bat up for auction. A savvy move. However much it nets, the memory of nabbing such a rare item — which apparently also included a night out with Charles Barkley — and the hilarity of the circumstances under which he rediscovered it, can be cherished forever.
At the very least, Todd should invest in displaying it in his home. Hard to think of a better conversation piece than that.
