Charles Barkley has placed the blame squarely on TNT management for the network losing out on NBA rights in the league’s upcoming media deal.
On Wednesday, it was reported that the NBA was in the process of formalizing deals with Disney (ESPN/ABC), NBC, and Amazon. Beginning with the 2025-26 season, those companies will be the ones broadcasting NBA games.
That leaves out TNT, which has been one of the homes for NBA games since 1989. That loss is further compounded by the fact that TNT’s absence means losing Inside the NBA, the Emmy Award-winning talk show of which Barkley’s a key part.
Speaking on The Dan Patrick Show, Barkley revealed that morale among TNT’s NBA staff is low.
“Morale sucks, plain and simple,” he said. “I just feel so bad for the people I work with, Dan. These people have families, and I just really feel bad for them right now.
“These people I work with, they screwed this thing up, clearly; and we have zero idea what’s gonna happen. I don’t feel good, I’m not gonna lie — especially when they came out and said we bought college football. I was like, ‘Well damn, they could’ve used that money to buy the NBA [media rights].”
In the current media deal, Disney pays $1.4 billion annually for the league’s “A” package — which includes primetime games, the conference finals and NBA Finals — while WBD pays $1.2 billion for the “B” package. Disney was reportedly adamant on not letting the “A” package hit the open market and offered $2.8 billion per year for it in the next deal. WBD CEO David Zaslav, reportedly expecting to pay around $2 billion for the “B” package, was not interested in going to $2.4 billion — double the amount WBD currently pays.
Zaslav also infamously said his company didn’t “have to have the NBA” in an effort to lower the bidding price for the package. Instead, the NBA tested the market and landed on NBC.
“Sports is hard.”– Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav on rising costs and ratings challenges. Sports once “lifted all the boats.” Says we have favorable deal on March Madness, NHL and baseball playoffs. On NBA he says, “we don’t have to have NBA.”
— Joe Flint (@JBFlint) November 15, 2022
Barkley suspects the league didn’t take kindly to Zaslav’s comments.
“My two favorite wines are Inglenook and Opus,” Barkley said, “and these clowns I work for, they turned us into Ripple and Boone’s Farm and Thunderbird. Like, we got the best studio show — and it’s funny [because] we just won the best studio show [at the Sports Emmys] — but these fools turned us from Inglenook and Opus into damn Boone’s Farm and Ripple. It’s crazy.”
Watch above via The Dan Patrick Show
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