Sports / Basketball

The LEGO Basketball subtheme of Sports that ran from 2003 to 2005. In the first year, 2003, sets were licensed by the NBA and were based on real games, court games, and simple street games. The minifigures in this theme had spring-loaded legs and specially designed hands so players can shoot, pass and even reverse slam dunk. These minifigures also featured more realistic skin tones, being based on real-life NBA players from real teams.

The LEGO Sports theme was based on a number of sporting activities that included basketball, football, hockey and extreme sports. Most Sports theme sets included standard LEGO System elements and minifigures but also featured various new unique pieces to enable various playability functions that were characteristic to this theme and set it apart from other sports-related LEGO sets. The LEGO Group secured a number of licensing contracts which allowed LEGO to sell many of its sets with the official logos of major sports organizations.