Following several Las Vegas meetings of the NBA’s board of commissioners this week, league commissioner Adam Silver revealed in a presser that expansion is being explored, per Kevin Pelton of ESPN.
Still, Silver offered plenty of caveats before committing to a timeline.
“A lot of analysis still needs to be done and nothing’s been predetermined one way or another, and without any specific timeline,” Silver said. “We’re going to be as thorough as possible and look at all the potential issues.”
Silver had initially indicated that, after the league negotiated its next media rights deals in 2024, expansion would be explored more thoroughly. A year after the deal was agreed upon, adding teams is at last on the table.
“We’re now engaging in this in-depth analysis, something we weren’t prepared to do before,” Silver said. “But beyond that, as I said, it’s really day one of that analysis. In terms of price, potential timeline — too early to say. And again, I think that also assumes the outcome of this analysis. It is truly a complicated issue.”
The new media rights deals — splitting broadcast rights between ABC/ESPN, NBC/Peacock, and Amazon — will tip off for the 2025/26 season. As Silver cautioned, a big issue of concern is the long-term local regional broadcast rights for teams.
“We would be malpracticing if we didn’t figure out how local regional television is going to work before expanding,” Silver said. “The notion that we would hand over a team into a city where we’re not currently operating and say, ‘You’re going to have to figure out how you’re going to distribute your games to your local fans’ doesn’t make sense.”
Silver added that the impending sales of two top NBA franchises, the Lakers and Celtics, for a combined valuation of $16.1 billion, have helped affect the league’s value, even with local TV deals being so tenuous, notes Tim Reynolds of The Associated Press.
“There’s no question that those purchase prices have an impact on any economic analysis of teams, so it doesn’t necessarily complicate it more, but it certainly is an indication of value,” Silver said. “And one other factor we have to look at: we’re trying to think what is the value of expansion, what does it mean to dilute the existing equity, and how additive is this potentially to the league by adding an additional team.”
Another NBA franchise, the Trail Blazers, is facing an imminent sale. When asked by Sean Highkin of The Rose Garden Report (Substack link) about whether he would prefer the team stays in Portland after a new sale.
“It is our preference that that team remains in Portland,” Silver said. “We’ve had great success in Portland over the years. I don’t have a specific update on the process, but I know it is underway and there are groups that are actively engaged with the estate. One of the factors there is that the city of Portland likely needs a new arena, so that will be part of the challenge for any new ownership group coming in. But it would certainly be our preference for that team to remain in Portland.”
And this is why they won’t expand. The league benefits from the threat of Seattle. Portland will be sold and an arena built, New Orleans and Memphis will get arenas renovated with county or state money before expansion is approved.
Wow Just like that Portland is losing its team. Approve a new arena or we leave.
This was the MLB playbook for a long time. But when you over-expand, you lose that threat.
And the joke of it all as someone an hour from Seattle is they said out arena was no longer good enough, that it couldn’t be retrofitted to be enlarged for hockey. They were wrong as it was remodeled and the hockey team is playing in the same arena. Doesn’t seem the league feels too bad about the part that played in us losing our team. We continue to be a place with an awesome arena that is just good for putting a gun to other teams heads. It happened with Sacramento.