Audiophile LP's

Refence Recordings by Keith Johnson are among the best LPs ever made, and the musicians are generally superior to those recorded by Sheffield.

Check out the Better Records web store.

I know the owner can be a bit of a "hard" salesman with a pitch that can get annoying.

However, I can personally state that Hot Stampers are no hype,  The owner of the site has been able to perfect a system that allows him to compare vintage vinyl copies to identify the best sounding ones.

However, be prepared to pay a premium for this service.

I think the OP’s question was directed to LPs marketed as "audiophile" rather than the not so simple task of finding a "best pressing" among various commercial releases.
To the OP’s question, many of the direct to disc records sound fabulous-- the music itself is a question of taste.
The MoFi’s (the original ones pressed on the JVC vinyl in japan) were fabulously made and many were offered at a time when the quality of US vinyl was shoddy. In retrospect, my experience is that some of them hold up sonically, while others sound "fiddled with" compared to other, regular commercial copies. The vinyl formulation was superb, though, and in my view, has never been bettered.
At the time, most of these were more expensive than the standard issue, but not extraordinarily so. I have shelves full of them that I rarely listen to, from the old Mark Levinson and Wilsons, to various direct to disc, including M&K, Sheffield, Crystal Clear and a host of others, including a lot of the old MoFi.
I can’t comment on Tom Port- discussions of his business model usually involve controversy over the price of otherwise common pressings. The cost is in the identification of a good sounding copy. I go through this process on my own to lesser or greater degrees depending on the record and how much I care about it. That can be time consuming and costly.
There are some very well known "best" (or great) pressings -- copies that were generally released (not as "audiophile") and at the time, probably regarded as nothing special to most people. With the Death of Vinyl, and the obsessive pursuit of older, analog copies, entire communities have been built (virtually) around seeking out and comparing various pressings, identifying them by country of origin, pressing plant, deadwax nomenclature, etc.
This is different than collecting Blue Notes or other high value jazz or classical records which today command a high price.
The biggest bugaboo with old records, apart from identifying preferred pressings, is typically condition.
To the OP’s question, were these worth it at the time? I’d say yes, having bought and enjoyed many of them. I would distinguish this from the current audiophile pressings (almost always remastered reissues rather than original releases). In some cases, these current (even if out of print) audiophile releases make sense given the cost or scarcity (and condition) of the original releases. And in some cases, the audiophile remaster actually does sound better than the original commercial release (depending on what you call the "original").
I think, from today’s vantage point, looking back, you have to take it on a record by record basis, rather than declaring that an original pressing or the audiophile remaster is better. And, even in that comparison, people’s views will differ, depending on personal preference, system strengths (or weaknesses), etc.

Dear @jrpnde:  From latest 5-6 years ( maybe more. ) almost all the hype of those Audiophile spe ial recording pressings were/are only people making bu$sineSS taking each one of us money with out a true justifications.

I'm not against some one that is making money this is not the issue but that the " extremely high quality " they were/are talking about just does not exist.

Yes, there are a few " new pressings " that are really really good but the majority it's not. Problem is that the corrupted " reviewers " are part of that part of the corrupted AHEE.

I totally agree with @roberjerman @rodman99999  about the D2D Sheffield Labs recordings that are outstanding. I own all titles but the non-D2D Sheffield are very good too.
Crystal Clear D2D are good but not all of them the VirgilFox is really good. 
Nautilius is something as Crystal Clear where some are very good as the one named here.
Almost all Telarc's are exceptional recordings.
Some of the Denon PCM are very good too.
Some of the D2D M&K realtime recordings are a must to listen it.
Delos is another label with very good quality as is too Proprius and Reference Recordings.
Some Audioquest are really fine too as Opus and Athena.

There are new recordings ( not re-issues ) that are very good latter on I will try to post about.

Regards and enjoy the MUSIC NOT DISTORTIONS,
R.

I have most of the RRs and Sheffields (and actually appreciate the RRs a little more).Some of the Telarcs were also very good and I also like some of the EMIs for content and quality. However, I find LPs from Pierre Vernay (French) and OPUS 3 (Sweden) to be some of the best analog, but, of course of limited scope. At one point until these records appeared, I dropped out of the audiophile rat race because the discs in HP's list used to judge top equipment were nearly unobtainable.