{"id":630139,"date":"2026-02-28T11:00:32","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T11:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/630139\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T11:00:32","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T11:00:32","slug":"charles-barkley-tears-into-new-nba-media-rights-landscape-disservice-to-the-fans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/630139\/","title":{"rendered":"Charles Barkley tears into new NBA media rights landscape: \u2018Disservice to the fans\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Charles Barkley agrees with disenchanted NBA fans.<\/p>\n<p>The Basketball Hall of Famer <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/awfulannouncing\/status\/2027519551521386514?s=20\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:appeared on long-running ESPN show \u201cPardon the Interruption\u201d;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">appeared on long-running ESPN show \u201cPardon the Interruption\u201d<\/a> on Friday to discuss current matters in the NBA, particularly ranting about how hard it is to simply find games.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>The league\u2019s new media rights deal sprinkles games throughout ESPN\/ABC, NBC\/Peacock and Amazon\u2019s Prime Video.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"Charles Barkley stands in the second tee box during the first round of the American Century Championship at Edgewood Tahoe Golf Course on July 11, 2025 in Stateline, Nevada. Getty Images\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"960\" height=\"639\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"standard-img\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/6ee98ce408929427d09f2dda8359e2b6.jpeg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Charles Barkley stands in the second tee box during the first round of the American Century Championship at Edgewood Tahoe Golf Course on July 11, 2025 in Stateline, Nevada. Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Barkley isn\u2019t a fan of the whole setup.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is so difficult for fans to find the games now,\u201d Barkley told Michael Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser. \u201cI think we\u2019ve done a disservice to the fans and to the game. We\u2019ve got to find a way to let the fans know. Because the fans are the backbone, and we want to support these networks.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Barkley went on to say that people \u201cdon\u2019t know\u201d when games are on, and where.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve got to be very careful because we\u2019ve got an 11-year deal, and it\u2019s a team deal. The players are gonna be successful, but we want the networks to be successful also,\u201d Barkley continued.<\/p>\n<p>The new media rights deal, signed in July 2024, was inked for 11 years and $77 billion, and it kicked in this year.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Controversially, the deal didn\u2019t include TNT, which didn\u2019t appear to be keen on keeping the NBA product.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cInside The NBA,\u201d a long-running staple of TNT\u2019s coverage, has since been moved to ESPN and will air more often now that football season is over.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"Charles Barkley, Reggie Miller, and Spike Lee smile before the game between the Indiana Pacers and the New York Knicks during Game 5 of the 2025 Eastern Conference Finals. NBAE via Getty Images\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"960\" height=\"639\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"standard-img\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/abfa4ed28d81046af5c6511b72b7918a.jpeg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Charles Barkley, Reggie Miller, and Spike Lee smile before the game between the Indiana Pacers and the New York Knicks during Game 5 of the 2025 Eastern Conference Finals. NBAE via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Previously, TNT and ESPN shared the bulk of the nationally televised contests, not including the in-house NBA TV.<\/p>\n<p>Barkley, who continues to co-host alongside Ernie Johnson, Kenny Smith and Shaquille O\u2019Neal, has been a vocal proponent of the league becoming more \u201cfan-friendly\u201d as it relates to this media deal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Charles Barkley agrees with disenchanted NBA fans. The Basketball Hall of Famer appeared on long-running ESPN show \u201cPardon&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":630140,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3774],"tags":[69024,7,2001,2955,130,113,126,3866,82671,32161,6,191,114,1279],"class_list":["post-630139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-indiana-pacers","tag-2025-eastern-conference-finals","tag-basketball","tag-charles-barkley","tag-eastern-conference-finals","tag-espn","tag-indiana","tag-indiana-pacers","tag-indianapacers","tag-media-deal","tag-media-rights","tag-nba","tag-new-york-knicks","tag-pacers","tag-reggie-miller"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116147915134342001","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=630139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630139\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/630140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=630139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=630139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=630139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}