{"id":350546,"date":"2025-12-17T06:43:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T06:43:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/350546\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T06:43:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T06:43:10","slug":"nba-europe-franchise-bids-could-come-in-january","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/350546\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA Europe franchise bids could come in January"},"content":{"rendered":"

After months of fact-finding and vetting from J.P. Morgan and the Raine investment group, Commissioner Adam Silver said in a press conference Tuesday night that NBA is on the verge of \u201cserious\u201d talks with prospective NBA Europe<\/a> franchises in January that sources believe could be tantamount to open bidding.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to take this to the next level now, start having more specific conversations,\u201d Silver told Amazon\u2019s NBA on Prime later Tuesday. \u201cWe might say, \u2018Alright, you said you\u2019re interested–exactly what market are you interested in? How would you operate a team? Would you play in an existing venue? Would you build a new arena?\u2019 That\u2019s where we are.\u201d<\/p>\n

After roughly 18 months of planning, NBA Europe\u2019s financial blueprint is crystalizing by the day. A salary cap still needs to be formalized, but a source familiar with the template told SBJ the NBA\u2019s 30 current owners will own 50% of the league and the European franchises will own the other 50% \u2014similar to how the WNBA is structured. <\/p>\n

Current NBA owners will also not be allowed to invest in or own any part of an NBA Europe club, which would essentially rule out Arsenal from the bidding because it belongs to Nuggets owner Stan Kroenke.<\/p>\n

At last month\u2019s Dealmakers conference in N.Y., NBA Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum said he expected the league would begin seeking bids in the first quarter of 2026<\/a>, and insiders construed Silver\u2019s comments Tuesday to mean that could happen as soon as next month. Tatum also said in November that the 10-to-12 team league would launch in 2027 and potentially even play a preseason tournament against U.S. NBA teams that same year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would say we\u2019re casting a very, very wide net right now and essentially saying to anyone who\u2019s interested, \u2018Come see our bankers, explain to us why you\u2019re interested, how you view the opportunity, what resources you would put behind opening a team,\u2019\u201d Silver said in his press conference ahead of the NBA Cup Final in Las Vegas. \u201cAnd then we\u2019re taking all that information back, and then I think sometime in late January or in January, we\u2019ll be in a position to have more serious conversations with those interested parties.\u201d<\/p>\n

Source have said that the NBA is seeking franchise fees between $500M and $1B –or is willing to walk away — and Silver reiterated Tuesday night that the possibilities include \u201csoccer clubs, some who have basketball teams, some who don\u2019t have basketball teams, existing basketball organizations [from EuroLeague] who potentially would be interested in joining our league. We\u2019re talking to other organizations or individuals who don\u2019t own any team who would be interested if we expanded to Europe, looking at opportunities.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, Tatum has made no secret that the final franchises will likely be chosen from France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Turkey and Greece. And he has specifically mentioned potential EuroLeague clubs like Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich and LDLC ASVEL, which former NBAer Tony Parker owns<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe at the league office are still working on the economic model, want to make sure it makes sense,\u201d Silver said. \u201cAs I\u2019ve said before, many of the cities we\u2019d like to be in don\u2019t have a sufficient arena infrastructure, so that\u2019s something that we would need to work on in terms of private investment, maybe work with those municipalities, as well. We have been moving along on a very constructive path.\u201d<\/p>\n

During his interview with Amazon<\/a> Tuesday, Silver even described the concept of mixed-use districts surrounding European arenas, saying, \u201cI think about as you go across the United States, what\u2019s happened in so many of these markets where they built these incredibly vibrant arenas where they become community centers. There\u2019s all kinds of commercial and retail and residential development around them. There\u2019s the opportunity to do that in Europe as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

That said, there are other discreet details to iron out. For instance, Rockets F Kevin Durant is an investor in PSG<\/a>, another prospective NBA Europe franchise, and Silver said the NBA would have to \u201cfigure out a framework\u201d with the NBPA to decide whether that\u2019s allowable. Under the current CBA, NBA players can only invest in a WNBA franchise \u2014 not NBA teams.<\/p>\n

An NBA Europe investment, though, would perhaps constitute a whole other category.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After months of fact-finding and vetting from J.P. Morgan and the Raine investment group, Commissioner Adam Silver said…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":350547,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[434],"tags":[49,48,459,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-350546","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350546","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=350546"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350546\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/350547"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=350546"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=350546"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=350546"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}