Getty Image / Mitchell Layton
The television rights battle for the NBA is heating up, and it looks likely that ESPN and TNT won’t be the only rights holders. In fact, there seems to be a good chance the TNT could get left without any NBA rights at all.
That would be a terrible shame, as TNT broadcasts are pretty good. And, Inside the NBA, with Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith, and Shaquille O’Neal might be the best show on television.
Much of the talk about the TV rights battle, with Amazon and ESPN likely already having two of the three available slots, is centered around outlets like TNT, Netflix, Apple, YouTube TV and NBC. It seems unlikely that TNT could win that battle, as live sports are kind of the last frontier for some of these big streaming networks.
Not to worry, though. Charles Barkley’s contract with TNT allows him to leave the network should they lose rights.
Here’s more from Awful Announcing.
Appearing on ESPN Cleveland’s The Really Big Show on Wednesday, Charles Barkley was asked about his employer’s uncertain future when it comes to the NBA. And in doing so, the Hall of Fame power forward revealed that he has the ability to get out of his deal and would be willing to do so should TNT not get a part of the league’s next media rights package.
“I covered my ass to be honest with you,” Barkley said. “I just signed a 10-year deal two years ago, but one of the things I did was I put an opt-out in a couple years because I wanted to cover my ass when it comes to this situation.”
cont.
“I said, ‘If you guys lose the NBA, I want to make sure I can get out of here.’ So I am actually in a really great position,” Barkley said. “We knew it was going to be Amazon and Apple, but we didn’t know NBC was going to come out of the woodwork. But the one thing I particularly did in my contract, I put an opt-out clause in there. Listen, I love TNT, they’ve been great to me… I wanted to make sure that if we lost the NBA in two years, I could be a free agent.”
Barkley also made it clear that he would not hesitate to leave TNT if they lost the right.
All of the members of Inside the NBA re-upped their contracts prior at the same time in 2022. Could they all have this clause in their contract and move to a new network together? That remains to be seen.
The new NBA TV rights deal will go into effect for the 2025-2026 season.