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The Street

Colin Salao

NBA Commissioner apologizes to TNT workers for job uncertainty

Adam Silver NBA TNT WBD NBC Amazon Charles Barkley Ernie Johnson Turner Sports Comcast

A flurry of news has circulated about the NBA's next media rights deal partner, but the league has still not put pen to paper yet with any of its prospective partners despite this season already on its last legs.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the NBA is looking at a deal with Disney's (DIS) ESPN, Amazon (AMZN) , and Comcast's (CMCSA) NBC for around $76 billion, but Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) , one of the incumbents along with ESPN, is still not out of the running. Front Office Sports reported on June 6 that WBD still negotiate a smaller fourth package.

But with nothing set in stone, WBD, which will air NBA games on TNT until at least next season, is in flux about its future with the NBA. That includes the beloved "Inside The NBA" studio show carried by the quartet of Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith, and Shaquille O'Neal.

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver addressed the uncertainty surrounding the media rights deal and acknowledged the star foursome while also recognizing the staffers that help run the program. He apologized to the staff at TNT Sports, which he still referred to by its previous name of "Turner Sports."

"It has been difficult," Silver said. "['Inside The NBA'] in particular is special, and I have a close relationship with everyone who is on that show from the time they played in the league as well. And Ernie and I have been friends forever. At the same time, it's not just the talent, of course ...

"There's hundreds of people who are involved with what I still refer to as Turner Sports who have been long time friends and colleagues. And no different at the other networks. And it's on one hand, from the league standpoint, it's fantastic to be liked and to be wanted and to have multiple suitors. At the same time, it makes me uncomfortable that it's zero sum. That at the end of the day, there's only going to be so many television packages, there's only so many Finals games and playoff games and regular season games to distribute.

"I will say, directly from me ... the people who seem to be most impacted right now, the folks at Turner Sports, I apologize that this has been a prolonged process because I know they're committed to their jobs. I know people who work in this industry it's a large part of their identity and their families identity and no one likes this uncertainty," he said.

Silver added that he believes that it's the job of his team at the NBA to finish off the negotiations as soon as possible.

"I think it's on the league office to bring these negotiations to a head and conclude them as quickly as we can," Silver said.

WBD, as an incumbent, also has the rights to match a deal from either NBC or Amazon. However, the details of the matching rights are unclear because NBC and Amazon's ability to bring in streaming platforms in Peacock and Prime Video, respectively, as well as NBC's over-the-air channel that WBD does not have.

Reports have indicated that the NBA does not weigh the monetary bid of WBD as similar to NBC because of the latter's additional distribution offerings, which could lead to a lawsuit from WBD.

Silver was asked about this during the press conference, but decided against giving a firm answer.

"I'm not going to get into that only because it's a complex legal issue," Silver said.

1) Props to the reporter for asking Adam Silver about TNT having matching rights in the new TV deals. 2) It just seems so clear Silver doesn’t want TNT in the mix anymore for whatever reason. pic.twitter.com/nWHqi4nqWL
— Jimmy Traina (@JimmyTraina) June 7, 2024

Should the deal push through with the three reported partners, the NBA will see plenty of games that will be exclusively on Amazon's Prime Video and NBC's Peacock.

Silver recognized that the league is taking that step to follow the times, but also sees the additional value that streamers could provide consumers in terms of content.

"If you watch where the eyeballs are going ... we're all moving into watching premium programming into streaming services," Silver said. "It allows for tremendous additional functionality when it comes to watching games, personalization, customization of games, multiple feeds, multiple dialects, multiple languages, different camera angles. It really gives the fans enormous additional choice that you don't have with traditional television."

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But he said that the league is also trying to tow the line between the traditional linear channels and trying to find the perfect balance for what is expected to be an 11-year media rights deal.

"Trying to predict how fast this will move is I think what's so difficult," Silver said. "There's been a faster decline in cable viewership, cable usage and viewership, than people were predicting only even two years ago. And the move is happening fast to streaming services ... So we're sort of trying to put foot, hand, finger, into every one of those buckets."