LeBron James, Derek Jeter, Spike Lee Join Polymarket ‘Squads’

Polymarket is the world’s largest prediction market by trading volume, but the crypto-based platform trails in the US. In seeking to increase its market share for Polymarket.us, the company is betting big on multimillion-dollar partnerships with some of the biggest names in sports and pop culture.

With sports accounting for the most volume on prediction markets, Polymarket announced today (Sept. 8) that it’s bringing aboard LeBron James, Derek Jeter, and Eli Manning to promote its sports event contracts. The three icons have a combined 11 championship titles across their resumes.

James, Jeter, and Manning are helping Polymarket rollout Polymarket HQ, a fictional headquarters for the prediction market where each floor represents a different trading category. The first in a series of Polymarket HQ advertisements, James arrives on the “Sports” floor to find a chaotic workplace, where various athletes and celebrities are mulling over Polymarket trading.  

Along with James, Jeter, and Manning, the 60-second spot includes appearances by Spike Lee, Alexandra Daddario, John Leguizamo, Craig Robinson, Rajon Rondo, Reggie Bush, and Sue Bird.

With more than 231 million social media followers and global name recognition, LeBron commands top dollar for promotional deals. LeBron’s aligning with Polymarket followed his marketing deal with DraftKings, which is also now heavily invested in prediction markets, expiring over the summer.

Polymarket Groups

Polymarket wants to make trading on prediction markets more social. To that end, the platform is launching “Squads,” private spaces inside the Polymarket app where friends can socialize and discuss markets and share picks.

Polymarket plans to use the Polymarket HQ campaign to promote Squads. The platform says Squads “brings the conversations already happening in group chats” into the prediction market’s ecosystem.

With Squads, users can create private groups and invite friends to join. Members can chat about games, markets, and predictions, share positions and combos, and see what other Squad members are trading.

Socializing Prediction Markets

Polymarket continues to invest heavily in communalizing prediction markets.

This past March, Polymarket opened a popup prediction market destination in Washington, DC, called The Situation Room. Described as a “newsbar,” the venue on famed K Street featured large flatscreen televisions displaying real-time Polymarket markets, X feeds, and Bloomberg terminals, accompanied by a full-service bar and small plates.

The Situation Room was largely a bust, highlighted by a power issue on opening night that took the live data offline. Those who did patronize the venue primarily consisted of journalists instead of actual customers and traders.