12/07/2021 Orioles Slugger and Cancer Survivor Trey Mancini to Release NFTs During MLB Home Run Derby

Baltimore Orioles first baseman Trey Mancini is turning his Home Run Derby appearance into an opportunity to raise money for charity.

The NFTs will be available on the Ureeqa platform just before Mancini steps into the batter’s box at Denver’s Coors Field to take part in Major League Baseball’s all-star festivities on Monday, July 12.

Proceeds from the auction will go toward colon cancer awareness via the Trey Mancini Foundation, a charity that supports those facing the illness. The 29-year-old Mancini missed the 2020 MLB season after undergoing chemotherapy for his stage 3 colon cancer. His 2021 comeback has been an inspiration to many.

“This drop is extremely important to me,” Mancini said in a statement. “Not only is it my first experience with NFTs, but the cause is near and dear to my heart.”

It’s only the latest MLB tie-up with the world of digital collectibles. MLB’s Candy.com announced last week it will auction a physical 2020 Los Angeles Dodgers World Series ring as part of an NFT drop. In April, Topps announced it will issue MLB-licensed baseball cards as NFTs.

The Mancini NFTs were designed in collaboration with the team at BitBoy Crypto.

“Since Trey’s NFTs are going directly to charity, this project has a special place in our hearts,” BitBoy founder Ben Armstrong told CoinDesk in an email. “We believe that one of the greatest use cases for blockchain is helping people and this is a great illustration of that.”

There will be a 48-hour auction for the Mancini NFTs. The winner of the the top-shelf item will get the bat used by Mancini in the Home Run Derby plus signed cleats, signed batting gloves, and a one-on-one hitting lesson.

For baseball fans on a budget, there will be 500 Mancini NFTs inspired by a 1982 rookie card of Orioles legend Cal Ripken Jr. for $195 a pop. 

Update (July 11, 14:26 UTC): Clarifies who was involved in designing the NFTs.

Arts

https://www.coindesk.com/orioles-slugger-and-cancer-survivor-trey-mancini-to-release-nfts-during-mlb-home-run-derby

Interesting NFTs
Gen9 Googly Chestnut
Ciao! I'm Gen9 Googly Chestnut. I believe the world is flat. I am 86% gremlin, 79% Mad Scientist, and otherwise bad at math. I think you'll love me beclaws I have cattitude.
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AI Huascaq #3/5
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Part of a series of three artworks entitled "The Rulers". Inspired by the rulers of the animal kingdom, african mandalas & diamonds. A very complex digital illustration, each lion consists of hundreds of custom diamond shapes. Each background is an intricate custom mandala that compliments the lions facial features.
Alex in Wonderland
A figure, Alex, stands mostly naked in the midst of a physical and psychological maelstrom. He is clad only in nostalgic 80’s era socks, on a tenuous island between active waters and a variety of shark denizens. Sharks on the right side of the image are all beached, including a shark with a quartz crystal snout, an orange shark wrapped in a life buoy, and a shark further in the distance wearing an 80’s style shirt with the number “88”. On the left side is the largest shark, wearing bright glossy red lipstick and brandishing prominent teeth with braces. She is cordoned off from the figure by a roped float divider, and within her thought bubble is a warning symbol. Behind the figure, hovering in the air, are Grey aliens emerging from the distance, out of a series of elliptical UFO shaped interdimensional membranes. The Greys take on the visual form of spermazoa ostensibly impregnating the interdimensional thresholds. As is typical, these Greys inhabit a zone just behind the unconscious topology of Alex’s dissociative mind. Though Alex’s bottom half is representative, his top half mutates into a psychological cornucopia. In a manner akin to “Auto-Erotic Sphinx”, a predecessor work, the figure has self suctioned—an act of sensual infatuation, enjoyment, and exploration. Upward exists the figure’s primary conscious eye, adorned with a revolutionary beret emblazoned with a Bitcoin badge. The figure’s summit features the nose of a fighter jet facing off against video game Bullet Bills, one of whom is marked by a communist North Korean star. A cropped section of a UFO observes the contest. Alex’s mind branches both left and right. To the left is more singular embodied consciousness, manifesting two eyes and a Ganesh trunk grasping crayons. The right branch dissociates upward diagonally, emerging into an array of eyes, faces, teeth, tail, a unicorn horn, and much more—all of which participate in expressing his unconscious being; a democracy of psychic factions representing thought impressions and associations. All illumination and darkness– fernal, infernal, high consciousness and corporeal underbelly–reside in this realm. In the distance are relatively languid, light clouds, and against the firmament hovers a colossal distant eye peering over the scene and far beyond. This painting possesses underlying genetic traits with previous works such as “Auto-Erotic Sphinx with Toys”, “Dionysus”, and “Fuku-Shiva”. The work serves also as a nod to an earlier period of art inspiration during late teens and early twenties— born out of the nakedness, vulnerability, curiosity, and wonder inherent to coming of age and all subsequent psychedelic revelation.