The 12 NBA teams on Bally Sports would move to Amazon Prime Livestreaming
Jeff Bezos keeps dipping his toe further into the pool of sports broadcasting. After agreeing to broadcast Thursday Night Football in 2020, it appears Amazon Prime will be heading to the NBA market. According to the New York Post, Amazon is in the late stages of broadcasting 12 NBA teams, including the Milwaukee Bucks, on Amazon Prime:
Amazon is in the late stages of a deal to broadcast for 12 NBA Teams, including the Milwaukee #Bucks. https://t.co/iktjOlv8Pv
— Jackson Gross (@JGrossBucks) September 6, 2024
The deal would introduce Bucks games to Amazon Prime and fans would have to pay $20 per month to stream all non-nationally televised games. If the deal goes through on time, the service could launch as soon as next month to coincide with the start of the season. While Amazon would stream those games, Diamond and Bally Sports will still carry the games on cable as well. This also adds to the eleven-year deal Amazon made with the league to carry 66 nationally televised games starting in the 2025–26 season.
Late last month, Amazon pulled out of a previous offer to invest $115m in Diamond, but it appears talks continued. The terms aren’t yet known, though it isn’t exclusive and Diamond can sign similar agreements with other platforms. The hope with this Amazon deal is that it will prevent Diamond from falling further into bankruptcy (they filed for Chapter 11 in March 2023), as long as it can also find others with the likes of YouTube TV or other streaming services by November.
The other 11 NBA franchises that will fall under this umbrella will be the Atlanta Hawks, Charlotte Hornets, Cleveland Cavaliers, Detroit Pistons, Indiana Pacers, Los Angeles Clippers, Memphis Grizzlies, Miami Heat, Minnesota Timberwolves, Oklahoma City Thunder, and the San Antonio Spurs. Amazon will also gain the rights to the five MLB teams (including the Milwaukee Brewers) and nine NHL teams as well.
We’ll have more on this if anything becomes official.