And-Ones: Hawks, Lakers, Ayon, Collison

The NBA and its network partners expect to reach an agreement on new long-term media deals by the start of the regular season, sources tell John Lombardo and John Ourand of Sports Business Daily.  The new deal would see the league’s annual rights fee more than double, with ESPN and Turner combining to pay more than $2 billion per year on average.  As it stands, the NBA takes in $485MM per year from ESPN and $445MM from Turner, good for a little under $1 billion per year.  Several sources say the new deal will be an eight-year pact but one source says it’ll be a nine-year deal.  Here’s tonight’s look around the Association..

• Hawks co-owner Michael Gearon Jr. wrote a letter to majority owner Bruce Levenson in June asking to get rid of GM Danny Ferry, writes Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.  Vivlamore also reprinted Gearon’s account of Ferry’s controversial comment.
• The Lakers asked Byron Scott‘s opinion on their summer moves as they made them even before they hired the coach, who praised the team’s acquisitions of Carlos Boozer and Jeremy Lin in an interview with A. Martinez of 89.3 KPCC Public Radio.
• Barcelona was also in on Gustavo Ayon before he landed with Real Madrid, according to Marc Stein of ESPN.com (on Twitter).  We learned earlier today that the center signed with the Spanish club on a multi-year deal.
• Offseason addition Darren Collison knows it won’t be easy, but he’s excited about the opportunity to help lead the Kings, writes Steven Wilson of Kings.com.  “We have a relatively young team and there’s still going to be a lot to learn – there are going to be some road blocks and it’s not going to be easy where we want to go, but I’m excited to take on that role,” Collison said.

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.