CARD COLLECTOR HITS JORDAN JERSEY JACKPOT.

Byline: Phil Davis Daily News Staff Writer

Sason Dardashti borrowed $3 from a friend, bought a pack of Michael Jordan basketball cards and scored the collector's equivalent of a full-court shot - a rare card embedded with a piece of Jordan's jersey.

``I don't really like him, to tell you the truth, but I like his cards because they're valuable,'' the 12-year-old said.

True enough.

It is worth close to $1,800, or even more if the trend continues for this Upper Deck trading card, which just a year ago was valued at $900, according to the company and a collecting reference book.

If the seventh-grader has his way, he will eventually sell the card. After all, he said he's a Los Angeles Lakers fan all the way and more into flashy players like Kobe Bryant and Dennis Rodman than the more sedate Jordan, recently retired superman of the sport and former Chicago Bull.

When he bought the card, he said he had a good feeling he had made a good investment. ``I predicted it would be in there,'' he said.

His mother, Susan, smiled: ``This one, for sure, is going to be a businessman.''

Inserting pieces of sports memorabilia into cards - from game-worn jerseys to slivers of a Babe Ruth bat - is relatively new to the card collecting world. Unlike other cards that take decades to increase in value, if they increase at all, memorabilia cards are instantly hot. An Upper Deck baseball card with a piece of Ruth's bat in it is worth $2,000 to $3,000.

Had Sason's card been one of 23 jersey cards autographed by Jordan, it could net him up to $10,000 on the collector's market.

``It's instant gratification,'' said Rob Stenzel, an employee at Valley Baseball Card Shop in Tarzana, where Sason bought the jersey card. ``That's a big card as far as pulls we've had in our store.''

A ``pull'' is when the collector pulls a valuable card out of an ordinary pack.

The red Chicago Bulls road jersey on Sason's card was worn by Jordan in the 1992-93 championship season, said Terry Melia, hobby media manager at Upper Deck. The trading card company bought the jersey at an auction for $26,000 in August 1998. Swatches of the jersey were put in cards and inserted into one of every 288 packs.

Upper Deck won't say how many cards have the coveted jersey.

``Suffice to say, it's a rare pull for the kid,'' Melia said. ``This youngster basically paid $2.99 for a card that's worth close to $2,000. That's a pretty good return on his investment.''

Some collectors go a lifetime without pulling a big card. Sason has only been collecting for six months. His friend Daren Weintraub got him interested in collecting and loaned him the cash that netted the coveted card.

``He was happy for me,'' Sason said of his pal. ``I paid him back double.''

A few years ago, Sason might have had to settle for about $900 for the card, which lists for $1,800 in Beckett's, the Bible of card collecting. But an Internet collecting craze on sites like eBay means there are potentially millions of bidders for his card - and that drives up the price.

``There's a pretty strong market on eBay,'' Stenzel said. ``You've got the whole country going after it.''

So what will Sason do with all his cash?

``Dunno,'' he shrugs in classic teen-ager form. ``I'm not sure.''

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos

PHOTO (1--Color) Sason Dardashti, 12, shows off the jewel of his card collection - a Michael Jordan card with a swatch of His Airness' game jersey.

(2) Upper Deck puts a Michael Jordan jersey card, worth around $1,800 to collectors, in every 288th $2.99 pack.

John McCoy/Daily News