The NBA reportedly “hates” the way that ESPN is covering the league and has pressured Disney to make changes.
“I can also tell you that I’m right about the league and ESPN,” Five Reasons Sports’ Ethan J. Skolnick wrote on Discord. “The league hates the way ESPN covers it. They have pressured Disney to make changes. It shows up now when fans don’t know anything about 3 of the final four teams. But yes, the league agrees with me. ESPN’s coverage, on the whole (I’ll exclude qualified friends like JS and BW and a few others) is embarrassing and the teams and league officials don’t care for it. But they’re stuck. We will see what Amazon does.”
This isn’t the first time that Five Reasons Sports has talked about the impact of ESPN’s coverage on the NBA.
Back in November of 2024, the Five Reasons Sports posted on its X account that ESPN was responsible for the decline in NBA coverage while agreeing with a quote from Windhorst.
Brian is right and he does cover the entire league…
But his employer is 99% responsible for the decline in coverage https://t.co/kw6GzpJH3v
— Five Reasons Sports 🏀🏈⚾️🏒⚽️ (@5ReasonsSports) November 9, 2024
It’s disappointing to see that the NBA and ESPN – one of the league’s biggest partners – could potentially have an issue.
The NBA is set to enter a new media deal that will feature ESPN, but it will not feature one of the league’s current partners – TNT – in the 2025-26 season.
“The National Basketball Association (NBA) today announced the renewal of its partnership with The Walt Disney Company and new agreements with NBCUniversal (NBCU) and Amazon under which ABC/ESPN, NBC/Peacock and Prime Video will telecast NBA games beginning with the 2025-26 season and running through the 2035-36 season,” the NBA shared in a press release in July of last year.
It’s possible that new partners like Amazon and NBCUniversal will bring coverage in a way that the league enjoys, but fans and the league itself likely won’t be able to assess that until the 2025-26 season kicks off.
The NBA is at an interesting point in the 2024-25 season, as the league is set to have a new champion for the seventh straight season.
After the Golden State Warriors and Cleveland Cavaliers dominated a section of the late 2010s, the league has seen a ton of parity in recent seasons. One of the New York Knicks, Indiana Pacers, Minnesota Timberwolves or Oklahoma City Thunder will be crowned the champion later this postseason.
This season, ESPN will carry the Western Conference Finals between the Timberwolves and Thunder while TNT will carry the Eastern Conference Finals between the Knicks and Pacers.
Then, the NBA Finals will be on ABC.
As the NBA enters a lengthy new media rights deal that features ESPN, it’ll be interesting to see if the network makes any changes to its coverage next season.
