1968 Super Bowl II Game Used (Green Bay Packers Offense) Football with Spectacular Provenance. ...

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Sold on Feb 22, 2025 for:

$36,600.00 Bid Source: Internet bidder

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Includes original owner's ticket stub and period newspaper articles with photos!

1968 Super Bowl II Game Used (Green Bay Packers Offense) Football with Spectacular Provenance. It was deja vu all over again. On the same Miami proving grounds where the entrenched National Football League had asserted its dominance with a lopsided victory over the champions of the American Football League in the first edition of the Super Bowl a year earlier, the Green Bay Packers once against annihilated the upstarts (the Oakland Raiders this time) in the sequel to prove the pundits right. It's easy to see, after those first two editions, why Joe Namath was so universally doubted when he promised he'd win one for the AFL in Super Bowl III.

A man named John Jarman traveled thirty-four hours by bus from Rockford, Illinois to Miami to bear witness to the battle, his tale told in an included newspaper article entitled, "Local Man Snares Super Bowl Ball." We encourage all interested parties to read the text in its entirety at our online listing, but we'll excerpt it here. Jarman explains that he went down to the edge of the field for the express purpose of trying to get a ball, and watched from the edge of the Orange Bowl's dolphin tank as Hall of Fame cornerback Herb Adderley pick-sixed Raiders quarterback Daryle Lamonica in the fourth quarter. After Adderley violently dispatched a kid trying to grab the ball from him, the Packers set up for the extra point.

"The ball bounced up on the rocks, then right straight down in front of me, in the mud. I jumped on the ball, and about 16 guys jumped on me. Woods [a friend] was trying to pull them off, and when he realized it was me with the ball, he really started pulling. I finally got up, and I realized I didn't know what to do with the ball. A couple guys offered to buy it for about $39. Then a couple guards started running at me and told me to get out of there."

Jarman put the ball under his jacket and ran from the stadium, hiding out in a bus in the parking lot without any concern that the tally of thirty-three points the Packers concluded with the ball he held was in danger with under ten minutes to play and the Raiders having only scored seven.

The "Duke" model "Wilson" football bears the facsimile signature of Pete Rozelle and perfectly matches two photos of Jarman holding the ball proudly for a newspaper photographer. A third news photo finds Jarman presenting the ball for signing to Hall of Fame defensive end Willie Davis. Other signatures acquired by Jarman include Elijah Pitts, Bob Long, Steve Wright, Jim Weatherwax, Dick Kapp and Doug Hart. All are quite faded, but the signatures are certainly not the primary appeal of this exceedingly rare pigskin. It is slightly deflated but still holds air.

Along with Jarman's news clippings and heavily-worn ticket stub, the lot will be accompanied by a letter of provenance from our consignor, whose family acquired the ball from Jarman directly upon the assurance that the consignor's family member would become a Packers fan if Jarman gave him the ball. Period newspaper clippings. Ticket stub. Letter of provenance from consignor. LOA from Heritage Auctions. Full LOA from PSA/DNA.