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OPENING TIP
It's almost March, and the air is thick with basketballs carving their delicate parabolas through recirculated arena air. We all took a moment to decide who was doing it best this week, and the All-Star rosters arrived with a bit of a whimper.
Fans in Milwaukee, Atlanta, and briefly Phoenix considered being outraged over snubs to Khris Middleton, Trae Young, or Devin Booker (who will now replace an injured Anthony Davis). Young's averages of 27 points and 9.5 assists would be good enough for an invite in every previous year, but he doesn’t play any defense, and stats inflation is real in today's fast paced game. Khris Middleton is a real snub, but we have agreed as a nation to ignore the man (currently averaging 20-6-6 and shooting 44% from three) even if he starts shooting people on 5th Avenue. In the end, it felt like no one could muster too much outrage.
Perhaps we were too busy enjoying the play of Luka Doncic, or this Kitty riding a pop tart,
or even this highlight from LeBron James.
That dunk, we can all agree, is nasty. The kind of moment we all like to remember. But this extremely cromulent GIF of that moment is missing something. It’s just so... so... fungible.
Fortunately, there is an answer! Non-fungible tokens, or NFTs. NFTs are a way of theoretically ensuring the scarcity of digital media—think a YouTube clip stapled to a blockchain—and they are having a moment. NBA Top Shot, which is a basketball highlight NFT brought to you by the makers of Crypto Kitties, recently announced that the LeBron highlight above just sold for $208,000.
An NFT version of the kitten riding a pop tart (called NyanCat, we should explain to our readers over 17) just sold for $454,000. And then there is the OG (boring, physical) version of the NFT, the trading card. A number of Luka Doncic’s rookie cards just went at auction for $800,000 a pop.
It’s tempting to dismiss these skyrocketing “asset” values as some offshoot of the Bitcoin craze. Or perhaps a more sympathetic comparison is that they are the cat/pop tart equivalent of the Chateau Lafite 1869 bottle that went for $230,000 a few years ago.
But where Top Shot is concerned, at least, there may be a way to understand all of the hype. Today’s NBA fan has already embraced cheering for their fantasy team while monitoring their online moneyline parlay bet and simultaneously checking their favorite stars’ Instagram Stories.
The days of parking it on the couch and passively watching two hours of the local basketball teams’ stylings—with the obligatory light beer, car dealership, and personal injury law ads thrown in—are well behind us.
Fans want new ways to engage with the game, be it by beating up on their high school buddy’s fantasy team, picking up some cool cash because they teased the Lakers Over with Connor McGregor biting Logan Paul in the 5th round, or even “investing” in the scorching hot market for NBA Limited Edition, serial numbered rookie cards. Even the growth of amateur NBA analytics (or, in really sad, dire cases, NBA newsletters) is a sea change from the fandom of the past.
It’s easy to bemoan the fact that someone cares more about the player on their fantasy team than Da Bears themselves, but if that means that the NBA can generate some small interest in the shooting performance of, say, Larry Nance Jr. when he plays next to Jarrett Allen, that’s probably a win. NBA teams are frequently (how should we put this?) terrible, and can be hard to watch for even the most dedicated of fans… unless they have some skin in the game.
Live sports TV deals continue to increase in value, and the NBA ratings demise has been greatly exaggerated. But the NBA is no longer just competing with Baseball, Football, and sitting on the porch drinking. Rather, it must now pry eyes away from phones, streaming services, and Fortnite. The way to do that is to incubate a wide variety of content, preferably interactive content. Everything is niche now, and the more niches you provide the better.
Expect to hear much more about the League partnering with gambling markets, investing in DTC content, revenue sharing with Panini, and experimenting with adjustments like the Elam Ending. Adam Silver is on top of it; there is a reason that he was promoted from head of the League’s entertainment division.
So is the Top Shot phenomenon the future of basketball, or is it primed to crash and burn a la Crypto Kitties? We suspect the answer is... yes.
In the meantime, may we suggest someone get this on the blockchain?
Should be worth a cool six figures in no time.
TWEET OF THE WEEK
STL INVESTIGATES: PANINI ROOKIES
With our newfound interest in collectibles and a keen eye for value, we perused the recent Panini Prizm 2020-2021 Draft Picks set to look for a way to make our fortune. At first, we were utterly bewildered by the wide variety of versions of each card: 13 different versions of Aleksej Pokusevski seems a little excessive, and we love us some Poku.
As we pored through the data, we realized that there is a huge amount of variability in card prices even among similarly situated players, revealing potentially investable opportunities. Using data from sportscardspro.com, we cross referenced the price of the autographed version of each rookie’s card with their minutes played this season to look for values. (Numbers in parentheses are the player’s rating on Sam Vecenie’s recently released rankings).
Who’s overvalued
New York Knicks - Immanuel Quickley and Obi Toppin go for $70 more than Devin Vassell, despite being similar if not worse players. Maybe people are betting on the Knicks track record of developing young talent…
White Guys - Payton Pritchard is the obvious example, but we’ll throw Deni Avdija in here as well. These guys are double what they would be if they had a bit more melanin
James Wiseman - he’s good, but not “double the price of Anthony Edwards” good
LaMelo Ball - maybe we missed his Hall of Fame induction, but if we didn’t, $800 seems a tad high for Mr. Ball
Who’s undervalued
Xavier Tillman - the guy is contributing major minutes with the Grizzlies, and his card is under 10 bucks. Buy now!
Patrick Williams - he projects to have similar value to Halliburton, Edwards, and Wiseman, but is much lower priced
Isaac Okoro - this is a steal. The dude shut down Trae Young earlier this week, and has a developing game off the bounce
So there you have it: a scientific* and comprehensive* breakdown of everything you need to know* to become disgustingly wealthy* buying non-fungible tokens on the internet.*
* not investment advice
AT THE BUZZER
The aforementioned Sam Vecenie top prospect rankings. Comprehensive! (Athletic, $)
Anthony Edwards moons at an Irish reporter. Gotta love Ant -- he’s one of the most charismatic players in the league already. (Reddit)
Terry Rozier shills for Top Shot. This seems like a slight overpay for Hornets courtside seats. (Twitter)
Myles Turner trolls disgruntled fan via Venmo. Is that a business plan we smell?!? (ESPN)