NFL Launches NFT ‘Virtual Tickets’, Potential Future Trend in Sports Ticketing?

The US National Football League (NFL) is now attaching non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to its tickets, adding them as “virtual commemorative tickets” that will be automatically sent to fans’ Ticketmaster wallets moments after attending live games.

NFL Makes Plays into the Cryptosphere

The NFL has officially launched NFTs to replace ticket stubs for its fictures, at least for the remainder of matches this year. The league announced that fans who attend games through to the end of 2021 will be able to receive a “virtual commemorative ticket” (VCT) as an NFT in a Ticketmaster digital wallet. Virtual tickets will be live on the Polygon network.

The first VCT game took place on November 7 when the 49ers played the Cardinals, and the next event is scheduled for Thanksgiving for the Detroit Lions/Chicago Bears match. The announcement of NFL NFTs comes just two months after the league prohibited teams from selling NFTs and engaging in sponsorships from crypto trading firms.

Some Users Critical of Download Format

NFT club business development senior vice-president Bobby Gallo has said:

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. There is no better time than the upcoming holiday season to kick off this fun and engaging fan experience, starting with the Chicago Bears and Detroit Lions Thanksgiving Day matchup.

For fans to claim their NFTs, they need to have bought their match tickets through one of the licensed NFL Ticketing Network vendors – either Ticketmaster, SrubHub, SeatGeek, or a team’s corresponding ticket office.

However, some users are not entirely happy with the download format of NFL NFTs. Sportswriter Jacob Feldman took to Twitter to express his irritation: