Warner Bros. Discovery’s bid to stay in the business of basketball is anything but a slam dunk.
The media company has signaled in recent days to the NBA that it would like to discuss the prospect of carving out a small package of game rights to go alongside those already negotiated with Disney, Amazon and NBCUniversal, according to people familiar with the talks. Current NBA media rights are owned by Disney and Warner, but the contract behind them lapses after the 2024-2025 season, and the league has been in discussions with media companies for weeks over new contracts.
Warner Bros. Discovery and the NBA did not reach new terms during a recent window of exclusivity, these people said, but Warner would like the league to consider the idea of a “fourth package” — potentially to keep Warner from pressing what it believes are its rights to match the terms struck with any rival bidders for the games it currently controls. Such a maneuver would likely delay the NBA’s current efforts and keep Disney, NBC and Amazon from making production plans.
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