Representatives of the French blockchain startup Sorare announced an affiliate program with the National Basketball Association (NBA). Within its framework, a new virtual platform for a fantasy game will be launched using non-fungible tokens (NFT). In addition, an agreement was signed with the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA), which will also help in the implementation of the project.
In the fall of 2022, an officially licensed game called Sorare: NBA will be launched. As in other projects of this startup, gamers will be able to buy and sell digital NFT cards representing images of basketball players. Users will build rosters and earn points based on real-life performances by teams and athletes in the NBA regular season.
Analysts stressed that this is not the first experiment using NFT technology in the world of basketball. Previously, Dapper Labs released the popular NBA Top Shot Collection, capturing memorable NBA moments in non-fungible tokens. The Sorare project itself continues to grow, concluding more and more contracts with representatives from the world of sports. The company is already partnering with football and baseball leagues in the US.
Social media users emphasized that the new project could attract the attention of existing NBA Top Shot users and win them over to the new platform. In addition, basketball is very popular in the United States, which should greatly increase Sorare brand awareness in the country and attract new users.
