Warner Media has been a long-time partner of the NBA, with its broadcasts on TNT and one of basketball’s most popular pregame shows.

But the NBA, thanks to load management, boring, repetitive play, aging stars and extreme politics, is hemorrhaging viewers. Surprisingly, despite their long-standing broadcasting commitment, Warner lost out, effectively ending their relationship with the NBA. 

And Warner CEO David Zaslav confirmed recently that the entertainment giant thinks they made the right decision.

Zaslav spoke at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media, & Telecom Conference recently and said they’ve used the newly available funds to invest in other, often better, sports media properties.

“Our job is to make sure we have enough quality sports so that we’re creating real value for the distributors. And it turns out not doing the NBA was a great decision for us,” Zaslav said. “We picked up the College Football Playoff, we picked up NASCAR in the summer, we have a great lineup globally, and we saved a huge amount of money.”
 

Warner Media Roasts NBA As League’s Struggles Continue

That has to hurt for Adam Silver and the NBA owners, hearing that Warner thinks it was a “great decision” to stop spending big rights fees on professional basketball. It might hurt, but it’s impossible to argue with.

Warner isn’t entirely out of the NBA business, as they’ll continue to license Inside the NBA to ESPN. Zaslav thinks that’s all they need, instead of spending money on games viewers aren’t watching.

“A lot of the young generation don’t want to watch the whole game,” Zaslav said. “They want to go to one place. [Our highlights] are almost like a RedZone for basketball. So we think that’s a great growth engine.”

That’s…not a good sign for the NBA, or for ESPN.

The $2.6 billion ESPN paid for the NBA’s rights looks like one of the worst financial decisions in sports broadcast history, costing them their partnership with Major League Baseball. All the while, Warner celebrates that it dodged the NBA bullet. 

And it’s the NBA’s own fault. The stars often don’t care enough about regular season games to play in them. We’re down to effectively one play, three-point shots, and their incessant political lecturing from coaches and players turned off tens of millions of viewers.

It’s no wonder Zaslav’s so happy about investing in college football instead of professional basketball.