1997 Finest Embossed Gold Refractor Michael Jordan /74 #154 PSA 10 GEM MINT

The front of Michael Jordan’s 1997-98 Topps Finest Gold card showcases him as part of the “Masters” subset, and the flip side reminds collectors of one of his most masterful performances—a 55-point showcase in the first round of the 1997 Eastern Conference playoffs. The scoring outburst marked the eighth and final time Jordan notched at least 50 points in the postseason, and his ability to take over a game was a big reason why he won his ninth scoring championship during the regular season and hoisted the Larry O’Brien championship trophy at the end of the playoffs. Jordan’s cards, likewise, could take over sets in the late 1990s, as his 1997 Finest /74 Gold Embossed Refractor is the leading parallel from the various Refractor checklists. In 1997, Topps maintained the theming of Finest for a second straight year. The company broke the two-series set into three tiers—Bronze (common), Silver (uncommon), and Gold (rare)—and also categorized cards into various subsets that ran throughout the checklist. However, a partial parallel that featured an embossed version of the cards was new to the product. Only players featured on the 66 Silver and 40 Gold cards from the set received the embossment, and the hardest-to-find cards in the product were the Embossed Refractors. Each Gold Embossed Refractor features die-cutting based upon the subset—in Jordan’s case, a rounded die-cut that outlines a basketball—and the hyper-plaid Refractor pattern on the front and back. Collectors found a Gold Embossed Refractor once every 1,152 packs (meaning it took an average of 46,080 packs to find a specific player such as Jordan). The certification number on this card has been checked against the third-party grader's online database and is active as of 09/11/2025.