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American professional basketball player for the National Basketball Association (NBA) Kevin Durant, is joining Coinbase according to a recent report from Bloomberg. According to the report, Durant will appear as “a face of the brand” and will help promote the exchange’s advertising content.
NBA legend Kevin Durant, otherwise known as “KD,” has joined Coinbase in an advertising deal that will feature Durant as a Coinbase spokesperson. Durant plays for the Brooklyn Nets as a power forward and is widely considered one of the best professional basketball players of all time. The Brooklyn Nets star will join Coinbase as “a face of the brand” according to Durant’s manager, Rich Kleiman, speaking with Bloomberg.
While Kleiman says that KD does minimal amounts of brand partnerships, off-court, the Nets’ forward is one of the highest-paid basketball players in the world thanks to his deals with Nike and Foot Locker. “Kevin does very, very few brand deals and that was by design,” Kleiman stressed. “They’re this new model of brand partner for us, where they do integrate in all different parts of our business,” Durant’s manager further noted.
Furthermore, Durant and his investment fund called Thirty Five Ventures invested in Coinbase in 2017. The NBA legend joined the Coinbase $100 million funding round that year and has invested in other crypto asset companies such as Opensea. Speaking with Bloomberg’s Kim Bhasin, KD said that he’s always had an interest in financials and business. “Even when I was younger, I was always curious about the business side of things and always trying to learn from the people I’ve gotten to meet along the way,” Durant said.
The Brooklyn Nets’ power forward added:
Basketball was always number one for me, but it was clear that there was a lot more that I could accomplish if I had the right team around me.
Durant’s partnership follows a slew of sports deals that have taken place this year between sports-related agencies and athletes, and crypto companies. For instance, FTX has inked deals with the Los Angeles Angels’ Shohei Ohtani, Green Bay Packers running back Aaron Jones, and seven-time Super Bowl winner Tom Brady and his supermodel wife Gisele Bündchen. FTX has also partnered with Sports Illustrated and renamed the Miami Heat Arena to “FTX Arena.”
The exchange Crypto.com made a deal to rename the Los Angeles Lakers’ Staples Center to “Crypto.com Arena.” The exchange Crypto.com also inked a deal with the MMA entertainment firm UFC. The largest digital asset fund manager, Grayscale, has partnered with the National Football League (NFL) team the New York Giants. In fact, there have been so many sports deals this year that it has become one of the biggest trends in the crypto industry in 2021.
