Jaylen Brown, number 7 of the Boston Celtics, shoots a three-pointer against the Dallas Mavericks during Game 5 of the 2024 NBA Finals at TD Garden in Boston on June 17, 2024.
Nathaniel S. Butler | National Basketball Association | Getty Images
With the National Basketball Association's broadcast rights close to being finalized, Warner Bros. Discovery is poised to make its move.
The league has sent the official terms of its proposed new media rights contracts to Warner Bros. Discoverystarting a five-day period in which the media company can choose to match a package of streaming rights.
A TNT spokesman confirmed receipt of the documents and acknowledged the company is reviewing the terms. Warner Bros. Discovery received the contractual framework late Wednesday, according to people familiar with the matter, who asked not to be identified because the details are private.
The media rights agreement, as currently structured, includes agreements with Disney, from Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon for three separate packages of games, totaling $76 billion over 11 years, beginning with the 2025-26 season. It also includes WNBA games, which account for $2.2 billion of the total.
Warner Bros. Discovery intends to match a package of games that has been slated for Amazon, as first reported by CNBC in May, that includes both playoff games and the season’s tournament, according to the people familiar with the matter. Amazon has signed a deal with the NBA to pay $1.8 billion per year for its package, they said.
Next steps are unclear
When Warner Bros. Discovery formally announces its intent to match rights, it’s unclear what will happen next. The NBA may or may not have the right to reject Warner Bros. Discovery’s matching rights, and the league has been working with its lawyers for months in preparation for a potential lawsuit, according to people familiar with the matter.
Warner Bros. Discovery’s Turner Sports has been the NBA’s streaming partner for nearly 40 years. The company plans to argue that its matching rights (a holdover from its current media rights deal) apply to Amazon’s package of games, even though that package has been earmarked for a streaming-only service. Along with its TNT cable network, Warner Bros. Discovery owns Max, a competitor to Amazon’s Prime Video.
Still, Max has fewer subscribers than Prime Video — about 100 million, compared with Prime's more than 200 million global monthly subscribers. The streaming rights that are part of Amazon's package are global in nature, one of the people said.
TNT is also home to “Inside the NBA,” the popular NBA studio show featuring Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith and Shaquille O’Neal. Barkley has already said he plans to retire from the show after next season, regardless of the outcome of the broadcast rights deal.
“I have absolutely no idea about that,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said earlier this week at a news conference when asked what might or might not happen regarding Warner Bros. Discovery or the NBA's own network, NBA TV, which is operated by TNT Sports. “We'll see.”
Losing the NBA would be a major blow to Warner Bros. Discovery, which could lose about $600 million in advertising revenue and a potential decrease in cable affiliate fees if it loses the NBA, Wolfe Research media and entertainment analyst Peter Supino told MarketWatch earlier this week.
Warner Bros. Discovery shares have fallen 23% this year.
“I apologize that this has been a lengthy process, because I know they're committed to their jobs,” Silver said last month of Warner Bros. Discovery employees who work on NBA programming. “I know people who work in this industry, it's a big part of their identity and their family's identity, and nobody likes this uncertainty. I think it's the responsibility of the league office to bring these negotiations to a head and conclude them as quickly as possible.”
Disclosure: Comcast's NBCUniversal is the parent company of CNBC.
