I wrote about how LeBron James joined Polymarket during a moment of suddenly salient prediction market backlash. Today I have some thoughts on why LeBron might see the venture as, counterintuitively, good for his reputation. No, I’m not positing that James is deluded due to the reported $15 million Polymarket is paying him. People tend to rationalize what’s best for them financially, but that’s not what I’m positing here.
Instead, it’s this other dynamic, related to why I specifically backed out of a Polymarket deal: The peer-to-peer trading company is, as part of its own marketing, actively participating in what is now “media.” The Polymarket accounts are good at drafting off and boosting social media sports backlash, as a conscious advertising strategy. Let’s compare how Polymarket has discussed LeBron James in recent months, versus other NBA MVPs. Their viral targeting, I’d argue, is not exactly entirely fair or purely numbers-driven.