Throughout the New York Knicks playoff series against the Indiana Pacers, Warner Bros. Discovery president and chief executive officer David Zaslav has been seen sitting courtside at Madison Square Garden with a Knicks hat on watching the game. Zaslav and the company are reportedly in negotiations to try and retain media rights to the NBA, with whom the Turner Broadcasting entity has done business since 1984. Yet subsequent reports have stated that the likely outcome is in Comcast’s NBCUniversal receiving the final rights package, thus granting them NBA rights for the first time since 2002 and presumably shutting Warner Bros. Discovery and TNT Sports out. NBCUniversal was reportedly preparing a bid of $2.5 billion for rights to the NBA, according to The Wall Street Journal.
There has been discussion, however, as to whether or not Warner Bros. Discovery has the right to match a competing offer and if it would do so with NBCUniversal or potentially Amazon, which reportedly has the framework for a streaming package for $1.8 billion annually.
John Skipper, who was the president of ESPN at the time the company signed its existing nine-year media rights deal with the NBA, recalled that the two media rights deals the league signed were quite similar. He does not believe that it had the right to match, however, which led to subsequent discussion on the latest edition of The Sporting Class because of the ambiguity and intrigue surrounding the Warner Bros. Discovery contract. The Walt Disney Company (ESPN/ABC) has also reportedly reached a framework for a media rights package for approximately $2.6 billion a year, which would include keeping the NBA Finals on its networks.
“I am puzzled and don’t understand how they could have a right to match, and I really have a hard time understanding how they could have a right to match Amazon because that is not even the same package,” Skipper said. “You get a right to renegotiate your own package – an exclusive negotiating window. I never had much luck getting a match right because that dramatically decreases the rightsholders’ chances to get the most money, so I’m puzzled, and I do not believe we had that right.
“I do not believe TNT had that right, which would mean that subsequently somehow when there was this consolidation of these assets into Warner Bros. Discovery, they got the NBA to agree to let them have a matching right.”
Meadowlark Media personality and former Miami Marlins team president David Samson was seen on camera ostensibly mouthing the word ‘Wow’ as Skipper provided this explanation. After Skipper concluded, he said that the people in the booth would know which part of the show to clip because of what was said. Samson referred to Skipper stating that Warner Bros. Discovery had been lying for the last two months, an accusation he refuted. Instead, Skipper articulated that he was stating what he knew to his knowledge.
“It’s not for me to accuse anybody of mendacity, but I am puzzled by it,” Skipper said, referring to Warner Bros. Discovery and TNT Sports.
“Puzzled because you have signed a deal that is supposed to be quite similar to the deal that they are also working with and doesn’t have the thing that they say that they have?,” Samson questioned.
“I can’t be privy or read anybody’s mind as of what may have happened subsequent to those signatures,” Skipper replied.
During the Warner Bros. Discovery Upfront on Wednesday in New York City, TNT Sports division chairman and chief executive officer Luis Silberwasser addressed the situation surrounding the NBA. Within his remarks, he stated that the company was looking forward to another season and reaching a deal that makes sense for all of the parties. WBD CEO David Zaslav has previously stated that he believes his company has the right to match. Both Warner Bros. Discovery and The Walt Disney Company have one year left on their existing NBA contracts, which expire at the end of the 2024-25 season.
“They will do ad business in the next year,” Skipper said of the message at the Upfront, “and they’re just reminding the advertisers in the audience not to change their budgets yet.”
