Joel Keeps It 100 💯
Featuring a Historic Stat Line, Sorare Shipping, Top Shot Tumbleweeds and more
Good Morning, B&B Squad! Hope you had an excellent weekend, and that your week is off to a great start!
We got our first snow in Chicago yesterday, and it had me feeling some kind of way (which Joakim Noah accurately describes):
Some other fun clips from the hardcourt to brighten your morning:
Victor Wembanyama’s 3PT-runner of sorts is going to be a signature move. What are you supposed to do as a defender with this?
San Francisco 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo gets a warm welcome from the Golden State Warriors cheerleaders at Monday’s game. Get this guy a modeling gig already.
Behold, the rare free throw wedgie (No Dunks probably loved this).
Let’s get into all the action from the last few days:
TFM x Evaluate 🤝
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Start meeting new collectors instantly and swap NFTs by visiting evaluate.xyz!
*Important Note* — This feature will be live at 10 AM EST today.
Keeping it 100 💯
Joel Embiid had a night to remember on Sunday, with one of the best single-game performances in NBA history in the 76ers win over the Jazz.
The final line: 59 points (19/28 FG, 20/24 FT), 11 rebounds, 8 assists, 7 blocks in 37 minutes.
This may shock you, but those stats translated well into Sorare, breaking the game week with a ridiculous 100 points:
In honor of this achievement, I made him a special piece of art:
We’re now onto Game Week 8, and the platform continued to ship feature updates — with a new counteroffer system that allows managers to negotiate trade and offer terms:
As someone who only joined the platform for Sorare NBA a few months ago, the smoothness of the platform and constant product updates have been super impressive. Maybe the kinks were worked out on the soccer and baseball products, but regardless — its a seamless, refreshing experience.
We always hear the thought that mass adoption will happen when the user doesn’t know they are interacting with the blockchain/NFTs, and my experience on Sorare so far embodies that philosophy.
And it seems to be resonating with others, with competition entries up across the board. We’ve seen other sports projects start out hot and lose momentum — hell, if you’re reading this, I don’t need to tell you that NFT sports tale as old as time. But so far, so good in Sorare.
Top Shot Talk 😴
Not a whole lotta action in the Top Shot streets, other than flash challenges chugging along and a new Jalen Brunson Fresh Threads challenge currently active.
The ‘Great Top Shot Burn’ was completed on Tuesday, removing over 2.5M moments from the ecosystem. Which is great!
What’s not that great:
And looking at the market data, it’s been another slow bleed since the August rise — with the market cap currently down to 420M.
Top Shot has some very cool experiences around the corner, and I’ve enjoyed the focus on storytelling and curating great moments. But as someone who looks at NFTs as investments, I can’t currently see a non-fandom reason to purchase more moments and engage. Which is… fine — and probably what the expectation should be!
However, it’s not what many early adopters felt when they signed up and grew with the platform — and it’ll be hard to ever put that expectation back in the box.
Around The First Mint 🗣
🎧 Crypto Is Just A Small Part of FIFA’s $7B Plan
The biggest tournament in the world is also the most corrupt organization on the planet. And guess what: the sell NFTs now! On today's show, we look at FIFA's mild swing into crypto, how they've overcome multiple scandals, and more importantly - where they make and spend $7 billion dollars every four years. We welcome Christopher Gaffrey, associate professor at NYU and a specialist on sports governance and urbanization, to dive deep into the workings of this global org.
🎧 Why Tom Brady’s $200M NFT Project Is Struggling
🎧 How Nike Plans to Double Revenue with NFTs
🎧 Why the Chicago Bulls are winning at NFTs (Feat. Luka Dukich)
Thanks for reading!
Follow Zach on Twitter at @GhostOfGregOden.
**This is not financial advice. Nothing in this newsletter, podcast, or publication should be considered financial or trading advice of any kind. Please do your own thorough research and make your own trading decisions. This is not advice.”
About The First Mint
A web3 sports community. Podcasts. Newsletters. Events.
We cover: Sorare, NBA Top Shot, NFL All Day, UFC Strike, MLB Candy, and more!
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