Famous Sports Memorabilia Stuck in Limbo After Museum Bankruptcy

What do a black sports bra, askateboard and a pair of sunglasses have in common?

Besides once belonging to some famous athletes -- the sports bra, for example, was famously exposed by soccer player Brandi Chastain after she kicked the game-winning goal in the 1999 World Cup -- the items all have been taking into custody as part of a bankruptcy proceeding, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

The items stuck in legal limbo include Chastain's bra, Tony Hawk's childhoodskateboard and racecar driver Richard Petty's trademark sunglasses, and all had been on loan to the now defunct Sports Museum of America in New York, a for-profit organization that recently declared Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

About 500 other famous sports artifacts have become entangled in the bankruptcy case. All of the items loaned to the museum are locked in a New Jersey storage facility and must be properly claimed by their owners or they face the auction block, the Wall Street Journal reported.

So Chastain could get her famous sport bra back -- but she'd have to pay $250, plus shipping.

"Thank goodness I have another one," she told the Journal.

Not all athletes are taking it as well.



Tony Hawk posted an outraged message on Twitter saying, "The court wants $1,500 to give me my stuff back." (The Journal also noted Hawk used some other "strong words of frustration.")

Meanwhile, major sports museums like The Pro Football Hall of Fame, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the World Golf Hall of Fame pulled their artifacts before the museum declared bankrupcty, the Journal reported.

Other items still stuck in storage include:

-- A gold medal won by Jesse Owens.

-- Yellow jerseys worn by cyclists Lance Armstrong and Greg LeMond.

-- A hockey uniform worn by 1980 Olympic captain Mike Eruzione.

-- Baseball jerseys used by Manny Ramirez and Pete Rose.

-- A no-hitter baseball thrown by Randy Johnson.

-- Jeff Gordon's childhood auto-racing goggles.

Click here to read more on this story from the Wall Street Journal.

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