Prime Time: Amazon's impact on NBA broadcasting / News - Basketnews.com

When the next NBA TV deal kicks in, Amazon will become one of the major partners of the league. Prime Video is expected to increase the quality of the service that NBA fans usually receive, but is its entry into the business good news?

Credit: AP-SCANPIX Credit AP-SCANPIX

The last few years have been a period of change for the NBA. The American League has been trying to shake things up to offer a more engaging product that can attract more new fans.

There was the introduction of two-way contracts and the implementation of the Play-In Tournament, which made the final part of the regular season significantly more engaging.

This year, the debut of the In-Season Tournament was another way to make a regular season more interesting, which is considered too long and boring by many.

There has yet to be a decent way to make the All-Star Game worth watching, but that is not a problem we are going to address today. Changes soon will come on the television front as well.

The NBA's current television rights will expire at the end of the 2024-2025 season, and the American League is currently in negotiations to renew these agreements. One of the major changes is the upcoming Amazon TV deal with the NBA.

In fact, as reported by several U.S. media outlets, the NBA and Amazon have reached an agreement in principle that will allow Prime Video, the Amazon-owned streaming platform, to join the major networks responsible for broadcasting NBA games.

Details of the deal are not yet known, but it will most likely be at least a 10-year partnership between the two parties, with Amazon set to broadcast a good number of regular season games and even some of the playoffs.

The NBA desires to have a partnership with three networks; one will be Prime Video itself, the other will continue to be ESPN, while for the third, there is currently an ongoing battle between NBC and TNT.

According to several rumors from the United States, NBC is reportedly proposing to the NBA a nearly $2.5 billion per year deal to purchase the third package of television rights.

If the deal goes through, TNT, which is a long-standing partner of the NBA and broadcasts the most popular NBA-related program, Inside the NBA with Ernie Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal, Charles Barkley, and Kenny Smith, could come out of the NBA landscape, creating a real revolution from a programming standpoint.

Inside the NBA with Ernie Johnson, Shaquille O'Neal, Charles Barkley, and Kenny SmithCredit AFP-Scanpix

It was no mystery that the NBA wanted to modernize the TV rights situation by bringing in at least one of the major streaming players currently on the market. The arrival of Amazon with Prime Video confirms the behemoth's willingness to invest in the world of sports on an ongoing basis.

Prime Video has also been broadcasting the NFL Thursday Night Football for several seasons. It has gained a large following, especially in the United States.

Prime Video also locally broadcasts the games of the New York Yankees, one of the most popular and significant MLB franchises. Amazon also heavily invested in sports rights in Europe.

For example, it holds part of the rights to the Champions League of soccer in Italy and is a major broadcaster of Ligue 1, the top French soccer league.

With Prime Video's entry into the NBA world, users will most likely witness greater personalization of the service.

One of Prime Video's best features is its ability to offer real-time information during live broadcasts. Thanks to its "X-Ray" system, which is already used to broadcast movies and TV series, it could become an extremely useful feature for sporting events as well.

Amazon also has a huge budget, which has enabled it to attract some of the leading sports talent to its broadcasts in recent years.

Amazon owner Jeff BezosCredit REUTERS - Scanpix

Regarding the NFL, for example, Prime Video recruited Al Michaels, a longtime American football commentator who immediately lent additional credibility to Amazon's programming.

It would not be surprising if Prime Video successfully attracts top-notch analysts to its programs devoted to the NBA, especially if TNT were to exit the NBA market and many of its commentators were to be left without a specific placement.

Interest in streaming services within the NBA is increasing considerably. Several NBA franchises, starting with the Utah Jazz, have created their own subscription-based streaming services that offer fans exclusive content and the ability to watch team games.

The era of cable TV seems to be coming to an end, and streaming services such as Prime Video, Netflix, or Hulu are much more convenient for users. Users can subscribe and cancel subscriptions freely with very few restrictions.

Moreover, Amazon's arrival within the NBA world could be strategic from a technological point of view.

Despite being one of the most advanced leagues, the NBA struggled to make the necessary changes to its streaming app, League Pass, which allows fans around the world to watch American league games.

League Pass is far from a perfect app. Technical problems are common, and streaming quality is certainly not always top-notch.

Amazon's technology, which through Prime Video instead offers top-notch streaming quality, could come in handy for the NBA to finally overcome the League Pass difficulties.

It is still not entirely clear what the NBA TV rights scenario will be when the current contract expires, which, as mentioned earlier, will end at the end of the 2024-2025 season, but there are not only positive aspects to analyze.

In all likelihood, the NBA will collect even more money than in the previous agreement, which means that media companies will have to spend more money to acquire the rights.

Adam SilverCredit Candice Ward-USA TODAY Sports – Scanpix

This news is not necessarily positive for users; a higher cost of buying the rights will almost certainly result in higher season subscription prices, which have risen significantly in recent years.

As pointed out by Tom Ziller in his newsletter, the base cost for an NBA fan will rise to at least $72 for the 2025-2026 season ($9 per month for an 8-month season) for subscriptions strictly necessary to follow national interest games.

For access to ESPN and the networks that are part of its "family," the cost will go up further since they cannot currently be viewed through a single platform.

In the United States, platforms that offer ESPN among their products cost at least $40 per month, reaching as high as $75-$80 per month for services such as YouTube TV.

The future of NBA TV is also unclear at the moment, as it was operated by TNT until now. If NBC's offer is accepted, TNT could leave the picture.

Finally, there is the issue of games being broadcast only locally and not live nationally. Streaming packages offered on platforms such as YouTube TV often include local games due to the presence of regional networks, but the situation is not always automatic.

As mentioned earlier, some franchises have begun to start their own streaming services through which they broadcast the games that used to be sent on local networks.

Other teams have decided to send at least a certain number of games unencrypted on local networks to increase their fan bases, and others are still tied to local networks that do not allow the retransmission of games on streaming services such as YouTube TV or Hulu.

There will also be the question of whether Amazon will be interested in the international rights to NBA games.

In Europe, each country has its own main broadcaster. As far as the NBA is concerned, could Amazon be interested in getting involved in Europe as well by taking international rights in many countries?

Amazon Prime VideoCredit ZUMAPRESS.com-Scanpix

This hypothesis should not be ruled out even if there is no certainty at the moment. An overbearing Amazon entry into the European market would clearly change things even further, pushing many more traditional broadcasters to change their services.

From a television perspective, it is evident how, from 2025 onward, the future of the NBA is set to change dramatically.

Users will have more opportunities for easy access to more games, and the average quality of the experience is set to rise through technological innovation.

But with the simultaneous presence of more options and more players on the market, the risk for the average user of having to pay an increasingly higher price without still being able to watch as many games as he or she would like is quite high.

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