The NBA announced a new television rights deal Monday morning, which locks ESPN/ABC and TNT on for another nine years at the conclusion of their current deal in two years.
The mega deal, which runs from 2016-17 through the 2024-25 season, has owners sitting very pretty. Remember the jokes about Steve Ballmer paying $2 billion for the Los Angeles Clippers? His deal doesn’t look so bad now, huh?
The three parties – NBA, ESPN/ABC, and TNT, have been working on a new deal since February. It was agreed upon and announced on Monday. [Photo via bflo360.com.]
And because of all the new money trading hands, it seems inevitable that the Players Association will want to re-open negotiations in three years, as allowed by the Collective Bargaining Agreement.
With this deal, it seems nearly impossible for teams not to be profitable. And if they’re not, the foolishness should be blamed on the team running itself into the ground.
The only group that dislikes the new deal, of course, is those parties that wanted a stake in the media rights — FOX, NBC, Google, Apple, etc. By completing the deal now, ESPN/ABC and TNT ensured that the NBA could not even negotiate with new entities. They most certainly overpaid to prevent that, but it’s a wise investment.
As for the Pacers, two years seems like a long ways away. Team President Larry Bird has a year-to-year handshake agreement with owner Herb Simon, who I could see transitioning out by the end of the decade. Peter Dinwiddie, the VP of Basketball Operations, could quite possibly have a larger role — either with his hometown team or elsewhere. Head coach Frank Vogel is currently on the last year of his contract but it seems likely that he would still be at the helm.
The Pacers are set up nicely for years to come. Team officials will have plenty of flexibility, as Paul George ($18.3M), George Hill ($8M), and C.J. Miles ($4.58M) are the lone three players that are under contract for the 2016-17 season, the first year of the new TV deal. The team also holds team options for Solomon Hill ($2.3M) and Damjan Rudež ($1.19M), and they’ll likely have nearly $50 million to spend. The luxury tax threshold for this season, for example, is $76.829 million.
George will be 26 — crazy, right! — feeling great, and hopefully just accomplished his life-long dream of winning a gold medal with Team USA. The 2016 Olympics are in Rio.
Highlights of the Deal:
- NBA has their rights set through the 2024-25 season with an annual stream of $2.66 billion coming in.
- TNT will have opening night, 12 more games after the All-Star break, more postseason games than any other network, enhanced digital rights for BleacherReport, and rights to broadcast an end-of-the-season awards show.
- ESPN/ABC will have the first and last game of the playoffs, 10 more regular-season games (to raise its total to 100), rights to broadcast Summer League and D-League games, a new over-the-top offering (like NBA League Pass), 750 new hours of NBA programming, and an extension of their WNBA rights through 2025.