NFL Fans Get Polygon-based Virtual Ticket NFTs In Place Of Ticket Stubs In Ticketmaster Partnership

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are becoming more commonplace as sports franchises embrace cryptographically-unique assets. The latest is the National Football League (NFL).

Ticketmaster And NFL Release NFTs Powered By Polygon Network

An announcement contained in a blog post by Ticketmaster noted that fans will now receive a virtual ticket featuring NFTs instead of the regular ticket stubs. This will be used when attending games for the rest of the year.

Fans attending games will get their NFT in a Ticketmaster digital wallet after making payments. The NFTs will be hosted on the Polygon Network, and NFL fans will have to make their ticket purchases from only authorized Ticketing Network vendors such as Ticketmaster, StubHub, SeatGeek, or visit their team’s official ticket office.

NFTs represent specialized blockchain-based tokens that are used to show ownership of digital items ranging from arts, gifs, images, special game characters, or weapons.

Recently, they have received immense interest, with popular personalities keying into the nascent sub-sector. NFL star Tom Brady has been active in the NFT ecosystem with his NFT platform Autograph, reflecting a strong interest in NFTs.

Senior vice president of NFL club business development, Bobby Gallo, said the league is employing innovation and technology to create “one-to-one experiences” a high priority.

“​​Leveraging the emerging world of NFTs is a new and exciting way for us to create additional value and to further engage with fans who attend select games by providing a virtual commemorative ticket.”

The NFL has picked the Thanksgiving Day game of the Chicago Bears at the Detroit Lions’ Ford Field as the occasion for distributing the NFTs.

Only fans who attend the game will receive the virtual NFT tickets, although others can get a glimpse of them on the NFL marketplace.

NFTs Are Here To Stay In The NFL

This season, the league had already made a big announcement regarding a partnership with NFT-facing protocol Dapper Labs.

The American sports entertainment show announced the imminent release of an NFT marketplace to be hosted on Dapper’s Flow blockchain.

The Flow blockchain is already home to the likes of the well-known National Basketball Association (NBA) and CryptoKitties upcoming digital collectible marketplaces made for the Spanish League (LaLiga) and the Ultimate Fighting Champion (UFC).

A spokesman for the NFL, Matt Basta, believes that this new initiative for fan engagement with Ticketmaster is different from its partnership with Dapper Labs.

The agreement with Dapper Labs will see the NFL offer digital collectibles of video highlights to fans. The Flow-based NFT marketplace is expected to launch before the end of the current season in February 2022.

On its Twitter account, the organization has already started requesting fans to tag various exciting plays that they want transformed into NFTs. This request from the Dapper Labs has generated varied responses from fans who are anxious to have their favorite clips and play moments become video collectible that they can own and store.