Expansion has been a hot topic for the NBA in recent years, with a prevailing thought that the league would add two franchises after it settled its media-rights future.
But even with ESPN, NBC, and Amazon Prime Video starting 11-year, $77 billion deals next season, NBA commissioner Adam Silver doesn’t want to guarantee that the league’s current 30 owners will green-light expansion in the immediate future.
“The current sense is we should be exploring it,” Silver said Thursday night ahead of Game 1 of the NBA Finals. “I don’t think it’s automatic, because it depends on your perspective on the future of the league. Expansion, in a way, is selling equity in the league. And if you believe in the league, you don’t necessarily want to add partners.”
Silver said expansion will be discussed at an owners meeting in July around the NBA Summer League in Las Vegas, which had long been believed to be a front-runner for an expansion franchise alongside Seattle.
A formal process for adding teams could begin after that. “There’s been no lack of interest,” Silver said, while noting he has so far not engaged with many “unsolicited calls” from prospective cities interested in a team.
“We recognize there are underserved markets in the United States and elsewhere,” Silver said. “And I think markets that deserve to have NBA teams, probably even, if we were to expand, more than we can serve.”
One issue Silver raised for potential expansion franchises is the uncertain state of local media-rights deals in the NBA. “Several of our teams’ regional networks have actually shut down,” he said. “Others have recently come out of bankruptcy. Others seem to be teetering. We’re going through a transition in media.”
