Matthews joins digital collectibles boom
Limited NFT art pieces up for auction, with some proceeds going to charity
Move over, trading cards. There’s a new wave of collectibles in sports — and Auston Matthews is among the first in hockey to get in on the craze.
The Maple Leafs centre’s first collection of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) dropped on Wednesday.
The “Auston Matthews x The 34 Collection” consists of 107 limited-edition pieces of digital artwork, like digital hockey cards, which fuse his style with a few of his interests and highlights, according to OpenSea, the NFT marketplace where the auction went live.
The collection’s big-ticket item is a piece called “Papi,” a nickname family and friends gave Matthews growing up, that depicts the back of his No. 34 jersey with a Papi nameplate. Only one unique edition, digitally signed by Matthews, will be sold and won’t be minted again.
The winner will also receive a signed Papi jersey, a personalized message from Matthews, two tickets to a Leafs game and a virtual meet-and-greet with the player.
The highest bid in cryptocurrency as of late Wednesday afternoon was for the equivalent of $7,900.
Matthews’ collection also includes four editions of a digitally-signed NFT called “First Four,” which comes with a signed puck and personalized message.
Thirty-four editions of three other NFTs — Blade Gang, Day and Night and The Journey — are also up for grabs.
A portion of the proceeds from the auction will be donated to Sick Kids Foundation and the fight against cystic fibrosis. Auctions for each individual item are live until Saturday night at 8 p.m. ET.
Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and Tampa Bay Buccaneers tight end Rob Gronkowski are among professional athletes who have recently made millions on NFT trading cards and digital artwork.
NBA Top Shot, a platform that allows fans to buy, sell and trade numbered versions of specific, officially licensed video highlights— sold a clip of a LeBron James dunk over Sacramento Kings’ Nemanja Bjelica, for a record $208,000 (U.S.) in February.
Raptors guard Kyle Lowry is among the investors in Vancouver-based Dapper Labs, the Canadian blockchain technology company behind the virual NBA trading card site.
NFTs have come to play in sports, and experts believe they’re here to stay.
Trading cards and other memorabilia were already part of sports’ broader market of collectibles, products that are worth billions of dollars combined because of their rarity, said Alex Tapscott, co-author of “Blockchain Revolution: How the Technology Behind bitcoin Is Changing Money, Business and the World.”
The NFT, a totally unique digital assest backed by blockchain technology that acts like a certificate of authenticity, replicates that scarcity in the online world.
“People say, ‘Well, I can’t hang a piece of digital art on my wall,’ ” Tapscott said. “Well, that might be true, but why would someone spend $100,000 on an Auston Matthews rookie card or $1 million on a LeBron James rookie card? It’s because they have an emotional attachment to the athlete. It’s because it confers certain status; being the person who owns that makes people feel good. And also it’s an asset that can be, potentially, resold and you can make a profit.”
Andreas Park, an associate professor of finance at the University of Toronto who specializes in blockchain technology, agrees that emotional attachment has helped drive the overall surge in NFTs, the value of which quadrupled to $250 million in 2020.
Take the clip of Kawhi Leonard’s playoff buzzer beater for the Raptors in 2019, for example.
“It was just an amazing moment in sports history when (the buzzer beater) happened,” Park said. “If you could be the single owner of that one, I think people take a lot of pride from that. Does it have tangible value? Well, if people are willing to take it from you for money then sure it does.”
Tapscott applauds Matthews for finding a new way to connect to his fan base, and monetize his brand. He would love to see more hockey players do those kinds of things and expects to see more NFTs in sport in general going forward.
“There’s definitely some exuberance right now,” he said. “Could that cool off for a period? Maybe. But in the long haul, is this going to be a feature of the sports world for a long time? I think so.”