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On an otherwise quiet Saturday, as almost an afterthought in reaction to some insider knowledge that THE RINGER’s Bill Simmons shared on X (what? Not Bluesky?!?!), news began to spread that had more than a shred of significance to me, and I suspect a lot of sports fans as well. Per THE WRAP’s Bruce Haring:
The legal entanglement between WBD and the NBA is over.
The lawsuit WBD filed in New York Supreme Court has been settled, the WSJ first reported on Saturday. Under the settlement, Warner Bros. Discovery will be able to develop new shows with the NBA and WBD will have international NBA rights in Northern Europe and Latin America, excluding Mexico and Brazil.
Warner Bros. Discovery also struck a deal with Disney to license the hit TNT show “Inside the NBA” to ESPN and ABC starting next season. The program features host Ernie Johnson, with analysis from Hall of Famer Charles Barkley and NBA champions Kenny Smith and Shaquille O’Neal. Bleacher Report and House of Highlights will continue to have NBA content.
THE ATHLETIC’s Andrew Marchand and Jenna West added a bit more detail:
TNT Sports will receive global rights outside of the United States for “Inside the NBA,” House of Highlights and its parent company, Bleacher Report, per the sources. TNT will have a full package of regular-season and playoff games outside of the U.S. Since there are no rights fees, TNT Sports is anticipated to be guaranteed $350 million for marketing support and advertising inventory in the first five years of the 11-year deal, according to sources briefed on the agreement.
Those particular revelations would seem to be what appealed to the tastes and experiences of our old friend Yosemite Zas, aka WBD honcho David Zaslav, and his aide de camp who spearheaded Discovery’s profitable international sports platform Eurosport, sports czar Luis Silberwasser. Eurosport owns rights to a host of top-tier events outside the U.S., including the Olympics, but produces little original content of its own, and rounds out its schedule with primarily secondary leagues and sports as far as Europeans go. But as long as the cost side of the ledger is wiped out, the balance sheet is more appealing to the beancounter mentalities of Zas and his trusty steed, Hi Ho Silber.
Reportedly TNT will also extract from ESPN a handful of Big 12 football and basketball games that in the wake of their newfound success with the SEC have now been relegated to even lesser priority slots, and just in time for the Roman candle in Colorado known as the Sanders family and Travis Hunter to move their circuses to other locales.
So TNT Sports, the foundation of the B/R sports tile on MAX, will soon have as its showcase events a couple of first round NCAA football playoff games that air head-to-head with the NFL, some MLB playoffs supplemented by a non-exclusive schedule of weekly in-season games, “B” and “C” college packages and a whole bunch of possibilities that could emerge from the talents of Barkley, Smith, Johnson and O’Neal–even as their signature program essentially relocates to their ostensible competitor and thus gives the earnest talent of Malika Andrews and Richard Jefferson who are among the principles of NBA COUNTDOWN and its sister shows far less pressure to deliver audience and credibility.
Sure sounds like a U.S. answer to Eurosport to me.
And as far as being able to build something new of consequence from the folks who sit at the INSIDE desks who will soon be fishing in another lake, let’s just say Channing Dungey and team’s work will be cut out for them. Their collective track records aren’t great, to be kind. Kenny Smith’s reality show lasted just one season. Same for O’Neal’s just-cancelled game show LUCKY 13. Johnson’s presence on baseball didn’t help them one iota, and not even Barkley can help the struggling sales of the drek sandwiches he’s been pitching.
As for why I’m so ticked off, I can reveal since it’s now a moot point that had the trial moved forward I was on a short list to be an expert witness on behalf of the NBA’s attorneys. Without boring you with details let’s just say that WBD’s allegations didn’t hold up very well when actual data and side-by-side comparisons with what NBC and Amazon Prime Video are bringing to the league were introduced. My role would have been to help the less experienced numbers crunchers at the NBA to construct that narrative as conclusively and succinctly as possible. I sure could have used the gig. I’m sorry to report that times are tough yet again.
So hey, Channing, maybe your team can use some help in finding some possibilities that could work for your skilled but now rudderless raw talent?
Just as your boss continues to demonstrate, talent is always available to the highest bidder. And right now, my price is reaaaally affordable.