A Complete Guide to Sorare: NBA
Sorare, a leading fantasy sports platform and marketplace, recently announced a major partnership with the National Basketball Association (NBA) and its Players Association, unveiling its latest web3 game, Sorare: NBA.
The NBA partnership builds on Sorare’s established games, Sorare: Football (soccer) – which features gameplay and partnerships with 300-plus clubs around the world – and Sorare: MLB, which includes gameplay and partnerships with all 30 Major League Baseball clubs in addition to its Players Association. Sorare’s new partnership with the NBA capitalizes on two emerging trends: the use of web3 and blockchains, and the global growth of basketball.
Love the NBA and/or web3 and want to learn more and get started with Sorare? Find everything you need to know about Sorare: NBA in our Beginner’s Guide.
What Is Sorare?
Sorare is a global fantasy sports game and marketplace transforming the way fans connect with the players and teams they love. With Sorare, you collect and compete with officially licensed digital player cards, showcasing your skills to win amazing rewards like game tickets, signed merchandise, and once-in-a-lifetime experiences such as meeting star athletes.
Moreover, Sorare is a web3 fantasy sports platform that utilizes NFTs and blockchain technology to provide an innovative experience to sports fans. Unlike traditional fantasy sports platforms, Sorare allows users to manage teams of players in multiple sports and be rewarded for their on-field performance. There are no costs or fees to sign up or play.
How Is Sorare Different From Other Fantasy Sports Games?
With Sorare, you own your digital player cards, managing and competing with them over their entire careers (if you don’t trade or sell them first). You decide whom to start week over week, season over season – building your dynasty just like a professional sports team owner or general manager. Plus, your digital player cards have real scarcity, authenticity, and utility both as a collectible and in playing fantasy.
And unlike other web3 fantasy sports platforms, Sorare has official licensing agreements with every major soccer league in the world, including all of the world’s leading professional soccer leagues, MLB, and now the NBA, allowing its users to manage fantasy lineups with major stars like Kylian Mbappe, Mike Trout, and LeBron James.
How Does Sorare Work?
Sorare uses NFTs and the blockchain to provide an intimate management mechanism for its fantasy sports players. Users can purchase officially licensed digital player cards from the Sorare marketplace via auctions or secondary sales.
Digital player cards can then be used to fill slots within fantasy sports lineups and contests hosted by Sorare.
For example, Sorare NBA players can purchase a LeBron James digital player card using a credit card or ETH. Once they’ve added the card to their team, they can then utilize it alongside other NBA digital player cards to fill valid lineups for contest entry.
While the Sorare platform heavily relies upon blockchain technology, all user interactions take place on its website or mobile application. Users are not required to have a familiarity with web3 wallets or the blockchain's technological underpinnings to get started.
How Do I Start Playing on Sorare?
Only an email address is required to get started on Sorare! Below, we’ll walk through the four simple steps required to enter your first fantasy basketball contest on Sorare’s NBA platform.
Beginner: How To Start Playing Sorare NBA
Ready to start playing on Sorare? It can be achieved in four simple steps.
1. Sign Up at Sorare.com
To start building your fantasy teams, you’ll first need a Sorare account. As noted above, this doesn’t require any intimidating steps with a cryptocurrency wallet. Instead, simply head to Sorare.com and click “Sign Up” to get started.
All you’ll need is an email, username, and password.
2. Claim Your Common NBA Player Cards
After you’ve created your Sorare account, you can start your Sorare NBA collecting with a free batch of digital player cards courtesy of Sorare.
To do so, head to Sorare’s NBA platform by choosing “NBA” from the homepage navigation, or by visiting Sorare.com/NBA.
Once there, you’ll have the option to choose one star NBA player to kickstart your collection. In addition to the star of your choosing, Sorare will also give you 19 more Common player cards.
While you won’t be able to choose these other 19 players, Sorare has guaranteed the distributions will be competitive. Common player cards can be used to earn rewards and join fantasy basketball contests on Sorare, but they cannot be sold on the marketplace. However, all other Sorare digital player card scarcities – Limited, Rare, Super Rare, and Unique – can be bought or sold on the marketplace.
3. Choose Your Contest
Once you’ve claimed your initial player cards, you can now begin to enter Sorare NBA contests.
Using the “Play” tab in the Sorare: NBA navigation menu, you’ll be directed to the Sorare: NBA lobby. The Sorare: NBA lobby provides a list of all the upcoming, live, and previously completed fantasy basketball contests.
In the lobby, Sorare: NBA contests are broken down by rarity tier (Scarcity) and type (Cap), both of which help dictate the requirements for fielding an eligible lineup. Alongside these details, the lobby also indicates the rewards and the number of participants who have already registered a team.
If you are logged in and in the lobby, Sorare makes it incredibly easy to understand which contests you can join based on your Sorare portfolio.
For example, users who have only claimed their Common player cards will only be eligible to join the Common-tier contests and therefore the “Register” button will only be enabled for Common contests.
Be careful when choosing your contest! The contest type can greatly influence the makeup of your lineup.
At the time of writing, Sorare has two major contest types: Champion and Contender. Different game types can yield distinctly different viable lineups.
Champion
Champion contests allow users to insert one “MVP” into their lineup. MVP status is provided to the player in a lineup that has the highest 10-game average of fantasy points scored. While this average typically counts against the “Points Cap” (Sorare’s salary cap-like mechanism) in the Champion contests, the MVP does not.
Contender
In Contender contests, users do not have the luxury of utilizing an MVP. That means every player card they insert into their lineup counts against the designated points cap. Most Contender contests operate with a points cap of 110 points, leaving around 22 points per player rostered.
Since the season began, Sorare has been experimenting with a variety of contest types to encourage the additional use of player portfolios! In the lobby, you may find contests that utilize extremely low player caps, contests for only Western Conference players, and more.
4. Beginner: Build Your Sorare NBA Lineup
Once you’ve determined which contest you want to join, you can begin to create your Sorare NBA lineup.
Each lineup requires five Sorare player cards of varying rarity tiers, depending on the contest requirements.
For example, in Common contests, all cards must be built using Common player cards. After registering for the contest, users will be directed to the lineup-building screen to compose their team. In the lineup builder, users can quickly scan through their eligible player cards and keep track of how many points are remaining in their allotted points cap.
Once you’ve fielded a team that’s under the cap, hit “submit” to join the contest!
4. Advanced: Build Your Sorare NBA Lineup
Advanced users on Sorare will be quick to recognize that building competitive NBA lineups will require a keen eye on a player's "10-game average." This average constitutes the amount of "points" that an individual player counts against the overall salary points cap, and is calculated by taking the average of the raw fantasy point total for a player over his last 10 games played.
For example, if Giannis scores 500 fantasy points during a 10-game stretch, his 10-game average is 50. This number is then prominently featured below the player card anywhere on site, most notably in blue underneath the player card in the lineup builder, or in a circle when viewing cards on the marketplace.
The 10-game average only considers games in which a player is active and plays. Any player who receives a DNP (did not play) will not have that performance counted toward his 10-game average. However, players that have played in fewer than 10 games will reach into the previous season to help build their 10-game average. If they did not play in the previous season, the average of their total games played will be counted as the average. When starting a season, a rookie will hold a 10-game average of zero.
Users are able to filter the marketplace and new card auctions by 10-game average.
In terms of the scoring system and categories, Sorare draws upon nearly a dozen stats to determine player impact as accurately as possible. These include common stats like points, rebounds, and assists as well as less-heralded metrics such as double-doubles and made 3-point field goals.
How Do I Buy Sorare NBA Cards?
There are two primary ways to add Sorare NBA cards to your portfolio: primary auctions and the secondary marketplace.
New Card Auctions
New card auctions feature newly minted, never-owned NBA player cards. The new card auctions can be accessed in the "Market" tab of Sorare: NBA, and house auctions for all players, and all rarity types in one convenient location.
While in the new auction view, users can quickly filter to auctions that are ending soon, newly listed auctions, and those with the highest and lowest price points. Additionally, users can filter to find auctions for only players they are interested in following or rarity tiers they wish to purchase, by utilizing the filter panel.
Secondary Marketplace
Users can also purchase Sorare NBA player cards on the secondary marketplace. In the "Market" tab of the navigation menu, users can select "Manager Sales" to find a whole inventory of listed Sorare player cards. Here users can utilize the same filters to find exactly the right fit for their team, including searching by rarity, player, points average, and more.
Advanced | Card Purchase History, Recent Sales
Advanced Sorare NBA users may wish to gain a better understanding of recently traded prices for a particular card and rarity. By drilling into an individual player card, users can learn more about that card and its rarity. For example, want to know the recent sales prices of Frank Ntilikna Limited cards? Drill into the player card and scroll down on the respective card page. Here you'll find details about the recent sales, Ntilikna's recent performances, and more.
Sorare NBA Scoring Rules
Each player rostered on your Sorare NBA team will accumulate fantasy points based on his on-court performance.
- Point: 1
- Rebound: 1.2
- Assist: 1.5
- Block: 3
- Steal: 3
- Turnover: -2
- Made 3PT FG: 1
- Double Double: 1
- Triple Double: 1
Advanced | Sorare Scoring Bonuses
In addition to the cumulative point score for player performance on a nightly basis, Sorare NBA cards may be awarded a bonus based on rarity and use.
The starting bonuses for each rarity tier are as follows:
- Limited - Level 0 - 0% bonus
- Rare - Level 20 - 10% bonus
- Super Rare - Level 40 - 20% bonus
- Unique - Level 80 - 40% bonus
In addition to these starting bonuses, each NBA card for the 2022-2023 season will receive a 5 percent bonus. Therefore, all Limited NBA cards in this season of use hold a starting bonus of 5 percent.
Let's use an example. If you win a brand new Jayson Tatum Rare card, it will start with a 10 percent bonus based on Rare status and level. If Tatum scores 100 fantasy points in a game, you will receive a bonus of 10 fantasy points as well.
Plus! Since the card is in use this season, you'll receive an additional bonus of 5 percent, giving a total score of 115 fantasy points for that game.
The level and bonus percentage of an individual card can be found below the card in your portfolio view.
Advanced | Player Card XP
Sorare NBA cards can earn additional bonuses by "leveling" up through the process of generating extra points (XP). XP is earned by using player cards in contests and is added to a player's base XP (75) at the conclusion of the game week.
Player XP is then added by multiplying the total score of the lineup the card was used in by 0.125 and adding it to the player's base.
For example, if you roster a Nikola Jokic card on a team that scores 100 total points, Jokic will earn 12.5 Player XP for the week. That Player XP is then added to the base (75), and ultimately 87.5 XP is added to your Jokic card.
Over the course of the season, the more XP your player cards earn, the faster they can level up and achieve additional bonus percentages, boosting their fantasy score (and in turn, their XP!).
Advanced | Training
During the course of the season, you may accumulate more cards than you can possibly roster during a given game week. But you don't need to leave these players on the bench!
Sorare NBA has a unique training feature, which allows your "unused" cards to gain XP and work toward additional bonuses every week.
In the lobby, users can select the "Training" contest and build lineups using any mix of card rarities and player caps. These lineups will not be eligible to win any prizes, but the players rostered will earn XP pursuant to the calculations above.
What Can I Win on Sorare NBA?
At the time of writing, fantasy basketball contests on Sorare provide winners with a variety of Sorare NBA player carsd. Depending on your finishing position and the contest type, this prize may vary in rarity and “tier.”
If you finish higher in a Sorare: NBA contest, your reward will yield a higher-caliber NBA player card than those who finish outside your tier.
Throughout the NBA season, Sorare has bolstered prize pools with a variety of fandom prizes like access to game tickets, signed jerseys, NBA League Passes, tickets, and more.
When Are Sorare Prizes Awarded?
Sorare allows prize winners to claim their player card rewards on the day after a game week concludes. For example, game weeks that end on Thursday will distribute rewards on Friday.
Can You Track Your Sorare NBA Team’s Performance?
Yes! Sorare offers a real-time scoring system and contest standings for each lineup and contest in a given game week.
To find the live contests, toggle to the Sorare NBA lobby and click “live” in the top right corner. This will allow you to track your own performance and analyze the lineup construction of your competitors to improve your managing skills!
Now that you have a basic understanding of Sorare NBA, you’ll be able to quickly and easily spin up your own fantasy basketball lineups.
For more in-depth coverage of the inner workings of Sorare’s NBA product, be sure to follow our game week previews and strategy articles!
