While the NBA remains in a media rights purgatory, waiting to see if and how Warner Bros. Discovery will use its matching rights to try to retain a part of the league’s new rights package, it has ensured that this high-stakes game of corporate chicken won’t happen again the next time around.
The NBA’s new media rights agreements do not contain matching rights for Disney, NBC and Amazon — the three companies that have come together to pay the league roughly $75 million over 11 years — according to industry sources briefed on the deals. The new rights deals will kick in with the start of the 2025-26 NBA season. They also include roughly a $2.2 billion, 11-year payout for the WNBA as that league’s next rights deal.
The NBA declined to comment.
Although the NBA’s board of governors have voted on and approved the incoming deals, they have not yet been officially finalized. Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav has publicly said that his company has matching rights from the current media rights deal to be able to retain one of the packages. It is believed to be eying the one signed with Amazon, which will pay the NBA an average of $1.8 billion per season for the ability to air six conference finals, playoff games, the NBA Cup and a Thursday night and weekend regular-season allotment.
Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns TNT Sports, has five days to decide whether to match the deal. That window began Wednesday night, according to CNBC.
The NBA is likely to dispute Warner Bros. Discovery’s interpretation of its backend rights, which could potentially lead to legal action if no compromise can be reached. Warner Bros. Discovery has until the end of the day Monday to tell the NBA its intentions.
Zaslav has repeatedly mentioned the matching rights provision.
“Under our current deal with the NBA, we have matching rights that allow us to match third-party offers before the NBA enters into an agreement with them,” he said in May.
The NBA is now entering murky territory. Even commissioner Adam Silver did not have a clear idea of where the league goes from here as it waits out the Warner Bros. Discovery’s next move, or how difficult the process will be.
“I don’t have a sense of that,” he said Tuesday. “Much of it is outside of my control. We’ll see.”
If Warner Bros. Discovery is unable to retain NBA rights it will end a four-decade run for the two companies. It will likely mean “Inside The NBA,” the beloved studio show starring Charles Barkley, Ernie Johnson, Shaquille O’Neal and Kenny Smith would be in jeopardy after next season. TNT could try to continue the show even without games; especially if it could wrangle a highlight package from the league.
The waiting game with Warner Bros. Discovery has also led to uncertainty over NBA TV’s future. The league runs the channel, and certain digital properties, in conjunction with Warner Bros. Discovery, and there has been little clarity on what will happen to it if the two sides break up, leading to apprehension for the company’s employees.
Silver said this week that while he has given “lots of thought” about what will happen to NBA TV in that scenario, there is too much up in the air for him to give a clear cut answer.
“I don’t know yet,” Silver said.
(Photo: Troy Taormina / USA Today)
