The NBA and Amazon Prime Video are finalizing a deal that will establish the streaming service as a key broadcast partner for the league for the next decade.
Prime Video will now join ESPN as an NBA broadcast partner, as Disney has also locked in a deal with the league. ESPN/ABC is expected to keep the Finals as part of their new agreement. As part of the deal, ESPN will reduce its number of games from around 100 to about 80, according to sources familiar with the negotiations.
Prime Video’s package will include a significant number of regular season and postseason games, and may even feature some conference finals. There is a possibility that Prime Video could start broadcasting Thursday night games in January, expanding its sports programming schedule following the NFL season.
The agreement is set to commence in the 2025-2026 season and will run for at least ten years.
The NBA is moving out of its current nine-year deals with ESPN and TNT, which have been paying the league an average of $2.6 billion per year. The NBA first signed an extension with ESPN and TNT in 2007, with a deal worth $930 million annually until the 2015-2016 season. Prior to that, the deal starting in 2002 was valued at $766 million per year.
The NBA is aiming to involve at least three companies in its new broadcast deals, leaving TNT to potentially compete with NBC for the remaining package. Warner Bros. Discovery, the parent company of TNT, has the option to match any offers made.