This Magic Moment 🪄
Featuring A Pack Drop Recap, A Magic Sale, Ime Udoka Drama, NF-Teamwork, A Creative Bulls NFT Drop & More
Good Morning, B&B Squad! Hope you all had an excellent week!
The news from around the NBA water cooler this week has been a troubling topic — the Ime Udoka situation. For those who haven’t been following, reports broke on Wednesday that the Boston Celtics coach was being suspended for the entire year for “his role in an intimate relationship with a female member of the franchise's staff”.
The reporting surrounding the investigation has been extremely vague — and the rush to break news or have a discourse has happened without a full picture of what’s going on. It’s a super weird situation, and there is surely a lot more to be unraveled soon.
In my opinion, the communication has been a massive failure — both from the reporters breaking shallow tabloid-esque stories without revealing the full picture, and from the Celtics organization in how they’ve handled the damage control. Speculation has spread like wildfire on social media, clearly to the detriment of the team’s female staffers:
I don’t know what is still to come out, or what to make of this with the lack of info still out there — but I have to imagine that these weren’t the headlines the NBA was hoping for with the season around the corner.
Let’s get into all the action from the last few days:
This Magic Moment 🪄
Top Shot had a flurry of pack drops this week, with Archive, Run It back and Run It Back Legacies packs hitting the platform over the past three days.
The Archive packs ($19) didn’t seem to get a ton of love on the market post-sale, with all 27 moments in the set currently holding a $6 or lower floor, per OTM.
The Run It Back rare packs ($119) had some clear favorites, with the face of the themed drop (Magic Johnson) leading the way at a nearly $300 low ask, followed by Knicks legend Patrick Ewing at $211.
Speaking of Patrick, here’s a timeless Snickers commercial from 2009 that I’ve always loved:
Onto the Legendary drop ($999), all but one player is currently holding a floor above pack price — with collectors having no love for Kevin McHale:
But the real prize was the solid gold hidden in 20 of the 450 total packs:
20 lucky collectors who open an 86-87 Run It Back: Legacies Pack will find a Legendary Magic Johnson Anthology Baby Hook Moment inside.
And despite the long odds, we saw two pulls of within our little TFM community! Shout out to Dollars_and_Sense and Awesemo for snagging an absolute grail of a hook shot.
Even Magic himself got in on the fun, purchasing his legendary moment for $12,888 after the drop on Friday:
You know what would’ve been even better marketing for Top Shot? Larry Bird buying that Magic moment and burning it!
NF-Teamwork 🤝
Filed under things you love to see — the Orlando Magic and Top Shot partnered up to do some good and create an amazing experience for kids in the Longwood, FL community:
Video here. Magic forward Franz Wagner joined former player and community ambassador Bo Outlaw to run a clinic for kids aged 10-12 on the new court — which looks truly awesome. Job well done all around, and initiatives like this are great to see!
Bulls on Parade 😤
If you’ve been reading this newsletter for a while, you might already know that the Chicago Bulls are my favorite team.
So it was a thrill to see my worlds collide a bit this week, with the organization making an art-focused entry into NFTs & Web3 with ‘The Aurochs’ — a collection of digital art reimagining the Bulls logo and sold via auction on Coinbase NFT:
The 23 1/1 pieces received 318 total bids, with 60.638 ETH (around $80,000) in sales. While I wasn’t a buyer, I appreciated the variety of artists — many with intimate ties to projects and the overall space, such as GxngYxng (Ghxsts), Bobby Hundreds (Adam Bomb Squad), SickPencil (Rumble Kong League), Claire Silver (AI Artist), Blake Jameison (Knights of Degen), Psych (Deadfellaz), Maliha (Women Rise), amongst other talents.
With how divisive NFTs can be outside of our little bubble, seeing one of the most well-known brands in the world authentically and creatively execute the drop.
Around The First Mint 🗣
🎧 How Premint is Making NFTs Less Painful (Feat. Brenden Mulligan)
There’s a golden question in NFTs - Where is it all going? There’s no straight answer here. The NFT boom came out of nowhere, as did its biggest players. So with no predictable origin, it’s challenging to predict a future, or a final act. But today's guest cares less for what the future holds, and more for what creators need right now today. He is a mission-based builder, and develop one of the industry's most useful tools, Premint. Brenden Mulligan joins us on the show.
🎧 Is NFL All Day the Answer to Sports NFTs? (Feat. Dave Feldman)
🎧 Why NFTs Will Be So Much Bigger Than We Think (Feat. Andrew Steinwold)
Thanks for reading! — Zach @ The First Mint
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
The First Mint is a web3 media company. We make. We write. We talk. We listen.