{"id":214601,"date":"2025-10-15T10:30:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-15T10:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/214601\/"},"modified":"2025-10-15T10:30:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-15T10:30:08","slug":"nba-announces-award-winners-debut-patch-programs-for-new-season","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/214601\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA announces award winners, debut patch programs for new season"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Dan HajduckyOct 15, 2025, 10:00 AM ET<\/p>\n

Close<\/a>Dan Hajducky is a staff writer for ESPN. He has an MFA in creative writing from Fairfield University and played on the men’s soccer teams at Fordham and Southern Connecticut State universities.<\/p>\n

Fanatics\/Topps will bring its debut patch and gold logo patch programs to the NBA this season, it was announced Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Editor’s Picks<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n

1 Related<\/p>\n

Every rookie will now wear an NBA debut patch on his uniform that will be removed after play and put onto an on-card-autographed, one-of-one numbered rookie card. The 2024-25 season’s Most Valuable Player, Rookie of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year will have a Gold NBA Logoman Patch placed on their uniforms, which will also be removed and inserted into rare trading cards.<\/p>\n

The 2024-25 MVP, Rookie of the Year and Defensive Player of the Year were, respectively, Oklahoma City<\/a>‘s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander<\/a>, San Antonio<\/a>‘s Stephon Castle<\/a> and Cleveland<\/a>‘s Evan Mobley<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“Imagine having LeBron [James]<\/a>‘s, [Michael] Jordan’s, [Steph] Curry<\/a>‘s debut patch and what that would mean?” Fanatics Collectibles CEO Michael Mahan said in an interview with ESPN. “Well, the next generational superstar will have a debut patch — the ultimate rookie card […] And trading cards haven’t been associated with achievement, success and accolades: We’re [bringing] that into trading cards.”<\/p>\n

Fanatics previously implemented the debut patch program into Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer.<\/p>\n

“Seeing the success Topps had with the MLB [debut] patch is definitely something we wanted to replicate on the basketball side,” said Josh Goodstadt, chief commercial officer of THINK450, the NBPA’s licensing, partnership and innovation arm. “The debut patch and gold logo cards [elevate] the storytelling and drive fan engagement with the sport and our players.”<\/p>\n

Mahan said Fanatics has a partnership with grader\/authenticator Certified Guaranty Company (CGC) to authenticate the patches.<\/p>\n

Fanatics also signed James to a deal in early 2024; like Jordan, James previously had partnered with Upper Deck for his entire career.<\/p>\n

“It’s going [to] be really awesome for collectors to have LeBron autographs on officially licensed cards,” Mahan said.<\/p>\n

Mahan told ESPN that the company has plans for James memorabilia, as well as releases that honor achievements of NBA stars of the “past, present and figuring out how to celebrate real success.”<\/p>\n

Mahan pointed to Topps’ celebration when Los Angeles Dodgers<\/a> pitcher Clayton Kershaw<\/a> reached 3,000 career strikeouts this season.<\/p>\n

“We did one-of-one autographs for him and every other member of that club,” Mahan said. “So, you think about important milestones coming up in basketball, the opportunity to do that as guys move up the scoring leaderboard — we want to honor the history of the game: There’s having a piece of the moment from the first and last times people step on the court.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dan HajduckyOct 15, 2025, 10:00 AM ET CloseDan Hajducky is a staff writer for ESPN. He has an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":214602,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[49,48,459,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-214601","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214601\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/214602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}