- TNT will no longer offer NBA games starting in the 2025-2026 season
The beloved studio show “Inside the NBA” was saved last week when TNT agreed to license it to ESPN, but Charles Barkley found out about the deal along with everyone else.
After Warner Bros. Discovery (TNT’s parent company) lost the NBA rights to the league’s new deal starting next year, putting ‘Inside the NBA’s future’ in huge doubt – The Wall Street Journal reported last week that ‘Inside’ would move to ESPN.
And while that news was positive for the show’s prospects, Barkley chafed at a lack of communication from his bosses in a recent interview.
‘I’ll tell you what’s fun. They didn’t even tell us we lost the NBA,” Barkley said on “The Bettor Angle” show on The BetQL Network. Terrible announcement.
‘We have to hear it through the media. And I even heard this ABC/ESPN thing on the Internet. Scott Van Pelt, Brian Windhorst, Elle Duncan, Bob Myers, all friends of mine that I really like. They texted me to welcome me to the ESPN family. I think: what happened? TNT didn’t even have the courtesy.
Charles Barkley criticized his TNT bosses for their lack of communication with him
Shaquille O’Neal (left), Ernie Johnson (center left), Kenny Smith (center right) and Charles Barkley (right) are seen during a broadcast of the 2023-2024 NBA season
“Basically, we got traded,” he continued about the show, which also features Shaquille O’Neal, Kenny Smith and host Ernie Johnson.
“If I were to trade someone I respected and valued, I would at least give them a heads up. I wouldn’t let others or the internet hear it.’
In July, the NBA announced a new 11-year TV rights deal beginning in the 2025-2026 season, extending its deal with the Walt Disney Company and inking new deals with NBCUniversal (NBCU) and Amazon, dropping WBD.
WBD announced plans in late July to invoke a clause in its contract with the league giving the company the right to match offers for future media rights – specifically in an effort to target the Amazon deal.
The NBA rejected WBD’s reported offer of $1.8 billion per year, saying the company could not fully meet the terms of Amazon’s contract.
In response to the lockout, WBD sued the league, arguing that their $1 billion offer matched Amazon’s deal.
That lawsuit was dropped due to the agreement to license “Inside the NBA” to ESPN.
In exchange for the rights to “Inside,” ESPN reportedly agreed to sublicense Big 12 college football and basketball games to WBD — which can air on TNT and on the company’s MAX streaming service.
It’s not clear if “Inside” would replace ESPN’s current NBA studio program, “NBA Countdown.”