For the first time in NFT history a community buys a professional basketball team as the Solana-based DeGods NFT project announced that it has acquired the Killer 3s team in the BIG3 league through its DAO.
The BIG 3 is a 3-on-3 basketball league started by actor and musician Ice Cube and entertainment business tycoon Jeff Kwatinetz in January 2017. Ice Cube caused a stir recently when he purchased DeGods NFT #3177 for 265 SOL, roughly $26,500.
DeGods has decided to buy 25 Fire-Tier editions of Killer 3’s NFTs, as well as the ability to whitelist up to 500 Gold-Tier NFTs for their community, in exchange for a share of the team’s ownership and utility.
This historic acquisition is part of the BIG3’s new ownership plan where they sell NFTs with ownership-like benefits in two tiers, with 12,000 editions total.
1000 of them for each of the league’s 12 clubs, with 25 Fire editions costing $25,000 each and 975 Gold editions costing $5000 apiece.
Added benefits for the community includes DeGods jersey patches on Killer 3’s jerseys, broadcast and scoreboard integrations, and special opportunities for DeGods community members.
As part of the deal, DeGods intend to offer tickets, merchandise, and part-ownership in $DUST tokens. They plan to leverage the IP to create independent revenue streams.
DeGods Founder, Frank DeGod stated “This is probably the most fascinating experiment in the entire NFT space right now. It’s cool because owning & operating a basketball team is a dream for millions of people. Now, we get to make that dream true for our holders.”
BIG3 co-founder, Jeff Kwatinetz added “The DeGods bring a diverse, very active, and forward thinking fan base to our league and we are looking forward to them spearheading community fandom for their team.”
Not only the BIG3 league but just a week back the NBA announced the launch of Association NFTs as a part of their Web3 initiative ‘NBAxNFT.’ But the Association NFT minting was paused after a major loophole was detected in the smart contracts.
