The NBA’s plans to formulate a centralized local broadcast streaming solution could happen a year earlier than anticipated.
According to a report by Tom Friend in Sports Business Journal on Thursday, the NBA is reportedly “in talks” with YouTube TV, Amazon, ESPN, and DAZN to serve as an aggregated hub of local game broadcasts for in-market viewing as early as next season. Puck’s John Ourand first reported similar talks last month.
Initially, NBA commissioner Adam Silver had suggested that the 2027-28 season would be the target for such a package, but the impending collapse of Main Street Sports Group, the local broadcast partner for 13 NBA teams, has accelerated that timeline.
Per Friend, industry insiders believe the deal “could be worth billions” for the NBA.
The challenge for the NBA would be to get enough teams on board for the package to be an attractive purchase for the aforementioned potential streaming partners. One could presume the 13 teams currently under contract with Main Street — the Hawks, Hornets, Cavaliers, Pistons, Pacers, Clippers, Grizzlies, Heat, Bucks, Timberwolves, Thunder, Magic, and Spurs — would be shoe-ins to join. Other likely candidates, Friend suggests, would be the four teams currently on local NBC Sports channels — the Celtics, Warriors, 76ers, and Kings. Additionally, five teams have already abandoned the regional sports network model entirely — the Suns, Jazz, Trail Blazers, Mavericks, and Pelicans — and could be persuaded to join the centralized package.
In total, that would make 22 of the 30 NBA teams available, with the potential of adding teams with their own regional sports networks, like the Wizards and Nuggets, along the way.
YouTube TV and DAZN have been particularly aggressive in pursuing an aggregated local broadcast package, Friend reports. DAZN has been courting the 13 Main Street teams in the event the NBA waits an additional year to launch the centralized hub, offering to sign teams to one-year bridge deals in the hopes of getting a leg up when the NBA does bring a combined package of local rights to market.
One obstacle the league could face is how to address League Pass, the NBA’s out-of-market streaming package that is currently licensed to Amazon. Ideally, the NBA’s centralized streaming hub would offer both in-market and out-of-market streaming options. At least that would seem to be the league’s preference. However, if the NBA chose to go with a platform that isn’t Amazon for its in-market rights, the two platforms would be separated.
If the NBA wants both in-market and out-of-market games on one platform, it’d need to find a way out of its current League Pass deal with Amazon, or simply sell the in-market package to Amazon in the first place.
The situation, as laid out by SBJ, remains very fluid. Teams are still holding their own talks with streamers, local over-the-air affiliates, and pay TV distributors in their markets to prepare for the possibility that the NBA could wait until 2027-28 to launch the centralized package. This creates a lot of uncertainty about where local broadcasts will end up next season.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.