There are cosmological truths to the universe of sports memorabilia — the authenticity issue, the personality factor, the Splinter of the True Cross beliefs — that pull the galaxies of Peyton Manning, Tiger Woods and Babe Ruth into eternity.

When you have all three combined — for example, when you can be absolutely certain that this baseball bat in your hands is indeed THE ONE used by Red Sox icon Ted Williams to hit his 400th home run — then you have a totemic item from years past, a bit of mythology in a wooden shaft.

“If a guy gets out his coin collection, all people are going to be impressed with is the overall value,” said Bill Mastro, owner of Mastro Auctions, who last year auctioned the aforementioned bat for more than $100,000. “But when he takes out a signed Babe Ruth ball, everybody says, `Wow!’ They know it’s worth a lot, but this is dealing with icons. It’s magic. It gets their blood going. You put a Babe Ruth bat, a Ted Williams bat, in his hands, and they know Ruth held that bat, it’s ‘Wow!’”

It’s a lesser version of what drove crusaders to search for the Holy Grail, why the Romans had a cult that venerated the remains of Oedipus, or why Judy Garland’s ruby-red slippers from “The Wizard of Oz” are on display in the Smithsonian. There is an idea that the works and possessions of the powerful or famous carry special significance, and to own such a thing oneself carries inherent value. It is an emotional connection to the distant past.

Then there’s the O.J. Simpson Mystery.

This is the question memorabilia dealers nationwide have been pondering in the weeks since Simpson was charged with robbery after storming into a Las Vegas hotel room and allegedly taking some of his own signed pictures and footballs (and many other items, such as Joe Montana lithographs) from a dealer of questionable background.

Why would he think anybody wants to buy stuff signed or owned by him?

While the sports memorabilia field has boomed into an industry worth a few billion dollars a year over the past decade, with popular athletes charging up to $150 to sign a single jersey at a trade show, Simpson — a Heisman trophy winner and Hall of Fame running back — has seen his memorabilia fall to depths not seen by any major athlete in modern times.

He is banned from nearly all trade shows. Brandon Steiner, CEO of Steiner Sports Marketing, one of the biggest agencies in the business, won’t get on the phone to discuss him. John Dee, marketing director of Authentic Sports Collectibles, says his Web site sells no Simpson material because “nobody wants it.”

The National Sports Collectors Convention, the biggest in the biz, kicked him out of the 2005 show when he made an unscheduled signing appearance. Robert Schmierer, director of the Philadelphia Sports Card & Memorabilia Show, lists an “O.J. Simpson Policy” on the packet he sends to dealers, banning everything but playing-era trading cards and the like. The National Football League does not sell his throwback jersey. The Pro Football Hall of Fame sells his photograph for $5 and nothing else.

Most Simpson items that pop up on eBay get no bids. Put it this way: The NFL Web site offers authentic team helmets for $269. An eBay auction for a Simpson-signed throwback Buffalo Bills helmet sold last week for $122.50 — less than half what any UNSIGNED helmet would cost.

So what in that room could have been so valuable that Simpson would risk jail time to get it?

“Any of these manufactured items that are not game-used or part of the game are not rare and won’t have much value,” says Dan Hitt, football price guide editor for Beckett Media, which publishes price guides for all sorts of sports memorabilia. “The value of things for living athletes is usually less than what collectors will think.”

Mastro, who runs an upscale auction house, recently auctioned a mint condition Mickey Mantle 1952 rookie baseball card, one of the most sought-after cards ever made, for $77,672. A complete set of Cracker Jack 1915 trading cards featuring iconic names like Ty Cobb, Walter Johnson, Honus Wagner and Connie Mack sold for $262,701.

Similarly, he’s had an early Simpson trading card in near-mint condition on sale for $45 for years. No takers. As Huggins points out, Simpson had notable on-field accomplishments, but nobody LIKES him. If people don’t LIKE you, your memorabilia is yesterday’s trash.

After his 1995 acquittal in the slayings of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ron Goldman, Simpson is about as close to an untouchable as this country can get. So what was it Simpson was after in Vegas?

According to the manifest released last week by the Las Vegas Police Department, there were a couple of hundred signed pictures of Simpson and 10 specially inscribed footballs. The pictures are pretty much worthless.