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Hobby star Ken Goldin makes next big sale in Season 2 of ‘King of Collectibles’
MLB legend Barry Bonds doesn’t do card shows, autograph signings or public appearances.
He rarely, if ever, sells memorabilia from his historic baseball career. And as baseball’s all-time home run leader, Bonds has quite a collection of valuable memorabilia collectors would love to get their hands on.
There is only one man he would entrust his collection to.
Ken Goldin.
“I met Ken 35 years ago and we’ve been close our entire lives. We’re like brothers,” Bonds says in Season 2 of the popular Netflix documentary “King of Collectibles: The Goldin Touch.”
Bonds is one of several sports legends who star in Season 2 of the show, which launches on Netflix on June 12.
The six-episode debut in 2023 was so successful that Netflix wasted little time renewing it for Season 2, which features eight new episodes.
“For Netflix, it was kind of like, ‘We think this will be a nice, small, neat show and as long as we get enough people to watch it, we will get renewed. We will look at it in 90 days,’” Goldin, the founder and chairman of Goldin Co., said in an interview with SCD.
“I didn’t expect to be top 10 in the United States, I didn’t expect to be top 10 in 13 different countries, and I didn’t expect tens of millions of people to watch.”
Less than 30 days after the show launched, Netflix announced there would be a Season 2.
The new season takes Goldin's search for the most coveted and valuable collectibles in the world to another level.
“I think as much as I liked Season 1, when I look at Season 2, I think, ‘Oh my god, the production quality is so much better, oh my god, the items are so much cooler, oh my god, my staff is much more comfortable,’” Goldin said.
The success of the show has helped Goldin Co. enhance its standing as one of the top-selling auction houses in the $44 billion sports collectibles hobby. The company, which was purchased by eBay earlier this year, saw its user base double since the launch of the show, Goldin said.
It also has helped him expand his celebrity profile. Since he began selling sports cards and collectibles on QVC in the late 1980s, Goldin has used his outgoing personality and salesmanship to become one of the most successful pitchmen in the hobby.
On the heels of Season 1, Goldin Co. had one of the most popular spaces at the National Sports Collectors Convention in Chicago last year, where collectors flocked to the Goldin booth to meet the star of the show.
With “King of Collectibles” playing on a big screen in the background, collectors who used to bring valuable memorabilia to consign now stood in long lines just to meet Goldin.
“I’m like, ‘Look, I’ve got the other 356 days a year that we can cut deals. These four days are just for me to give back to the public and fans of the show,” he said.
“King of Collectibles,” which drew an estimated 25 million viewers worldwide, was so popular that it was nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award and Goldin was invited to be one of the presenters.
“That is crazy. I went from Netflix being worried about how an unknown, middle-aged man was going to carry a show and draw an audience to a year later being asked to present at the Emmys,” Goldin said.
The show, which takes viewers behind the scenes of the fast-paced world of buying and selling valuable sports and non-sports collectibles, stars some of the biggest names in sports and some of the top movers and shakers in the hobby.
Mike Tyson, Logan Paul and Ric Flair all starred in Season 1. Goldin’s favorite episodes featured his son, Paul, opening Pokemon cards with Logan Paul and NBA legend Karl Malone consigning his 1992 Dream Team collection, which sold for more than $5 million at auction.
Season 2 features Bonds, Ronald Acuna Jr., Joe Montana and Reggie Jackson, who all consigned items to Goldin.
Goldin, 58, has known Bonds since his early 20s, when he got the rising MLB star to sign some autographs. They have a lot in common, he says.
“He grew up in the business with his family, and I grew up in a business with my dad and my family, and there are so many similarities,” he said. “And with all the s--- we have been through over the years between Barry and I and Barry’s life and everything, through thick and thin, we have remained friends. I know that I have been able to count on him for anything; he knows he has been able to count on me for anything, call on me any time, anything at all.”
In Season 2, Goldin flies to San Francisco to meet with Bonds. As a gift, he brings him the 1986 No. 7 Pirates jersey he wore before switching to 24.
Goldin convinces his longtime friend to consign part of his collection for auction and Bonds offers three magnificent pieces: the bat from his 554th career home run (valued at $50,000); the glove he wore the day he hit No. 700 ($35,000); and the full uniform he wore when he hit No. 750.
“I’m in,” Bonds says in Episode 3. “Right now, I’m at the point in my life where I believe [my collection] is everyone’s as well as mine.”
“He has held onto his stuff dearly and tightly throughout his career and for him to say ‘yes,’ not even a negotiation, not even arguing, just, “yes, yes, you’re the right guy to handle this, Ken, I trust you,’ that’s tremendous,” Goldin said.
Bonds’ home run memorabilia, along with items acquired during the show from Jackson and Montana, will highlight a special “King of Collectibles” auction after the launch of Season 2.
Though the second season features a wide range of pop culture and historical collectibles, sports cards, the lifeblood of the hobby, steal the show.
Episode 1 features Goldin making a jaunt from his New Jersey headquarters to Florida with the hope of acquiring a 1909-11 T206 Honus Wagner card. Long considered the holy grail of the hobby, the card, graded SGC 5, is one of the “nicest I have ever seen,” said Goldin, who valued it at $25 million.
In Episode 8, he’s in pursuit of another Wagner, “the Mona Lisa of the hobby.” Goldin flies to Phoenix, home to the NL champion Arizona Diamondbacks and managing partner Ken Kendrick, who owns a card and memorabilia collection valued at more than $100 million.
After showing Goldin some breath-taking cards—all the highest grades in the hobby, and worth millions—he unveils the only Wagner card graded PSA 8. Kendrick bought it for $2.8 million. Goldin calls it “the single greatest card ever,” and estimates its value at more than $50 million.
The show also features numerous jaw-dropping items from the worlds of pop culture, entertainment and history, from high-end comic books and video games to Tom Petty’s guitar and what is believed to be the mummified hand of Cleopatra.
Now powered by eBay, the largest collectibles marketplace in the world., Goldin hopes to expand his company from sports cards to a much wider range of collectibles.
“I want to be the high-end auction house, the Rolls Royce, Tiffany’s type of brand for collectibles,” he said.
Season 2 will be the next big step for the “King of Collectibles.”
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Jeff Owens is the editor of SCD.
