Warner Bros. Discovery Blocked From NBA Media Deal by Amazon

UPDATE—5:48 p.m.:

Following the NBA’s statement that it had rejected Warner Bros. Discovery’s attempt to match Amazon’s media rights offer, WBD fired back with a statement of its own from TNT Sports.

“We have matched the Amazon offer, as we have a contractual right to do, and do not believe the NBA can reject it,” the statement reads. “In doing so, they are rejecting the many fans who continue to show their unwavering support for our best-in-class coverage, delivered through the full combined reach of WBD’s video-first distribution platforms—including TNT, home to our four-decade partnership with the league, and Max, our leading streaming service.”

The statement continued, with TNT adding that the league has “grossly misinterpreted” its contractual rights and the company will “take appropriate action.”

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If Warner Bros. Discovery wants to keep broadcasting NBA games, it may need to go to a non-hardwood court to make it happen.

Top line

Just days after WBD insisted that it had exercised its “matching rights provision,” allowing it to counter a competitor’s offer and keep NBA broadcasts on its TNT network, the league responded by rejecting said offer at the rim.

“Warner Bros. Discovery’s most recent proposal did not match the terms of Amazon Prime Video’s offer and, therefore, we have entered into a long-term arrangement with Amazon,” the league said in its statement.

Between the lines

Earlier this month, The Athletic reported that the NBA had agreed to a media rights deal with NBCU, Amazon and ESPN worth roughly $76 billion over 11 years.

The league made it official today, noting that all of its national games would be available through streaming on Prime Video, Peacock and ESPN’s upcoming direct-to-consumer service. Meanwhile, approximately 75 regular-season games will be on broadcast TV each season (more than 20 on ABC and upwards of 50 on NBC), up from the minimum of 15 games under the current agreement.

“Throughout these negotiations, our primary objective has been to maximize the reach and accessibility of our games for our fans,” the league’s statement continued. “Our new arrangement with Amazon supports this goal by complementing the broadcast, cable and streaming packages that are already part of our new Disney and NBCUniversal arrangements.”

There’s just one minor issue: WBD appears to believe it’s contractually entitled to a share of the NBA broadcast agreement if it matched the bid for it—which, in Amazon’s case, was reportedly $1.8 billion per year.

WBD’s statement earlier this week referred to the “matching rights provision” as “an integral part of our current agreement and the rights we have paid for under it.” WBD’s statement implied that it “matched” an offer, which would “allow fans to keep enjoying our unparalleled coverage, including the best live game productions in the industry and our iconic studio shows and talent while building on our proven 40-year commitment for many more years.”

The NBA did not clarify which portions of the agreement WBD did not match but disagreed with WBD’s assessment while acknowledging a potentially awkward year of coverage ahead before the new media rights deal kicks in during the 2025-26 season.

“We are grateful to Turner Sports for its award-winning coverage of the NBA and look forward to another season of the NBA on TNT,” the statement noted.

Bottom line

Warner Bros. Discovery entered 2024 with roughly $45 billion in debt and a seeming willingness to offload costly sports properties. Yet it featured the NBA and host Charles Barkley prominently at this year’s upfront presentation.

It’s hard to break away from the NBA entirely when it has so many fans among brands. During the 2023-24 basketball season, television data and analytics firm EDO found that the league produced more than 56 billion impressions for its advertisers across more than 29,000 airings. That made the full NBA season four times more impactful for advertisers than the average primetime program. 

As the NBA regular season wore on, viewers were 12% more likely to engage with an ad during an NBA game than during the average primetime broadcast—up 15% from a season before. Once the playoffs began, viewers were 39% more likely to interact with an ad during game time than in primetime. That put the NBA second only to the National Football League in effectiveness for advertisers.

From the league’s perspective, stronger streaming only improves its game.

With 78% of NBA advertisers on linear networks also advertising on the league’s streaming broadcasts, SponsorUnited sees more opportunity for that hesitant 22% to join streaming channels. Bob Lynch, founder and CEO of SponsorUnited, previously told ADWEEK that Amazon—which already partners with the NBA for WNBA games—and other streamers help the league and its advertisers find fans and sell to them more directly.

“What streaming brings to the table is targetability,” Lynch said in June.