Get Your Piece of Shea and Yankee Stadium

Well, it certainly didn't take long. Just hours after the Yankees played their last game at the venerable Bronx stadium they've called home for 85 years, eBay (Stock Quote: EBAY) and Craigslist were awash with pieces of history for sale.

Vials of dirt were being hawked for $199.99; ticket stubs for $350; someone on Craigslist was even auctioning what he claimed was the last hot dog served at the stadium (wrapped up, frozen and with mustard packs included).

And that's just stuff available on the "black market." A day after the game, Steiner Sports—the memorabilia pros who have partnered with the Yankees to sell off the team's historical wares—were having a fire sale of their own.

Except that this fire sale wasn't for the bargain basement types. Steiner's website this week advertised a 30x18-inch piece of the center field scoreboard for $699 and a 10x10-foot chunk of the clubhouse blue carpet (with the Yankees logo) for a mere $10,000. Available too were five glass 31x60-inch shower stall doors (also adorned with the team logo) for just $2,000 a pop.

With both the Yankees and the Mets (who play their last regular season series at home this weekend) moving to shiny new digs adjacent to their current stadiums for the start of the 2009 season, talk about auctions and the sale of team and stadium memorabilia is swirling.

The city, which owns both stadiums, has been in negotiations with the teams on how to dispose of their contents, presumably at auction.

"We're working closely with both organizations to come up with a plan to sell items as memorabilia," says John Gallagher, a spokesman for Mayor Michael Bloomberg's office, who couldn't offer further details.

But what, if anything, should you buy as it becomes available? And what can you do with it?

According to the experts, investing in team memorabilia is almost always a bad decision. "It is never, never, ever a good investment," says Pete Williams, an expert on sports memorabilia and the author of Sports Memorabilia for Dummies and Card Sharks.

On the plus side for Mets fans, the team recently announced they'd donate about a third of proceeds from memorabilia to charity, so even if you don't get a return on your investment, you'll know you're helping a good cause.

Williams and others note that for the true fan coveting team memorabilia, stadium seats - which will available by the thousand in the coming months- are probably the best buy.

"Seats, unlike say dirt or a ticket stub, give you a real feel for the ballpark and are perfect for use in the garage or basement lounge or bar," says Timothy Locke, a private collector and distributor of memorabilia.

And the good news is that the market should be flooded with some 100,000 seats soon, so look for a bargain (or relative bargain) there, Locke says. Expect to pay about $500 a pop he notes.

Stay tuned for upcoming winter auctions and if with any luck, come April you can watch the season opener in an authentic stadium seat of your own. It might not replicate the feeling of being at the actual game, but given ticket prices these days, it will ultimately be easier on your wallet.