FANATICS FEST IN NEW YORK THIS WEEKEND
Auston Matthews and
Henrik Lundqvist are part of an elite guest list featuring sporting legends who will be in New York City this weekend for a first-of-its-kind show for fans, collectors and athletes.
Fanatics Fest NYC, a concept conceived, developed and operated by Fanatics, the multibillion dollar global sports distribution giant and NHL partner, will run from Friday through Sunday at the Javits Center.
"It's really, truly an immersive sports festival," said Lance Fensterman, the chief executive officer of Fanatics Events.
Matthews, the Toronto Maple Leafs center
who was named captain Wednesday, will be there Friday for photo ops and autographs.
Lundqvist will be there Sunday, joined by fellow former New York Rangers goalie
Mike Richter, and current Rangers defenseman
K'Andre Miller and forward
Matt Rempe. They will participate in a "No Quit New York" panel discussion that will be hosted by former Rangers forward
Tie Domi.
Lundqvist, Richter, Miller and Rempe will also be doing photo ops and signing autographs.
New York Islanders goalie
Ilya Sorokin will be in attendance Sunday for photo ops and autographs.
Other A-listers who will be at Fanatics Fest include Derek Jeter (Friday), Tom Brady (Friday), Eli Manning (Friday), David Ortiz (Friday), Julius Erving (Friday), Rob Gronkowski (Friday), Kevin Durant (Saturday), Barry Sanders (Saturday), Michael Strahan (Saturday), Jerry Rice (Saturday), Lawrence Taylor (Saturday), Cal Ripken Jr. (Saturday), Peyton Manning (Sunday), Mike Tyson (Sunday) and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (all three days).
"In sports, nothing like this exists," Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin said on "CBS Mornings" on Monday. "When I went to Comic Con I'm like, 'We need this for sports.' That's when we said we're going to build it, we're going to bring everybody out, and we've got this coming weekend 200 of the best athletes, artists, celebrities in the world coming together to launch fanatics fest at Javits."
In addition to autographs and photo ops, many of the athletes will be participating in interactive events with kids and various in-depth Q&As and panel discussions like the one that will feature Lundqvist, Rempe, Miller, Richter and Domi on Sunday.
"There's a huge presence for cards and collectibles; it'll be the largest card show that has ever happened in New York City," Fensterman said. "But then there is everything else. There will be about 50-60 panels with athletes in conversation, podcasts that will be recording live, an entire stage dedicated to just learning about card, hobby, memorabilia collecting, and we'll have the entire show floor filled with activations just like what the NHL is doing. All of the leagues will be there with memorabilia displays, interactive features. There will be autograph and photo ops with probably 200 athletes that are there appearing, signing.