James Dolan isn’t happy about the NBA’s new revenue sharing plan and is letting his dissatisfaction be known.
In a letter shared with the league’s Board of Governors, the Knicks’ owner was critical of a new $74.6 billion media deal that he says makes Regional Sports Networks “unviable,” and penalizes franchises like the Knicks that bring in the most revenue and rewards others that do not.
“The NBA has made the move to an NFL model — deemphasizing and depowering the local market,” Dolan wrote in the letter that was obtained by ESPN. “Soon, your only revenue concern will be the sale of tickets and what color next year’s jersey will be. Don’t worry, because due to revenue pooling, you are guaranteed to be neither a success nor a failure.
“Of course, to get there, the league must take down the successful franchises and redistribute to the less successful. This new media deal goes a long way to accomplishing that goal.”
Dolan was also unhappy with the idea that the NBA will retain eight percent of the media deal without “sufficient justification” for that percentage or transparency into how it came to that figure.
By comparison, he pointed out that the league is only retaining 0.5 percent in the current media deal for 2024-25.
The new deal, which includes platforms like Amazon Prime Video, Peacock and NBC along with ESPN and ABC, will make games available on a streaming service or local channel seven days a week.
That means fewer games for Regional Sports Networks like MSG, which televises a majority of the Knicks’ games.
This isn’t necessarily new for Dolan, who has expressed his displeasure with revenue sharing models in the past.
Last November, he resigned his positions on the league’s influential advisory/finance and media committees.
“The increased number of exclusive and non-exclusive games means that national partners would have the ability to air nearly half of the regular season and all postseason games. This reduction in available games for RSNs risks rendering the entire RSN model unviable,” he wrote. “The inclusion of streaming partners in the proposal allows fans in all NBA markets to bypass their RSN to watch certain games in their local market. The proposal offers no local protections for RSNs.”
Dolan believes other owners agree with him, at least those in a similar position to him.
“Once again, pride of ownership is what is sacrificed,” he wrote. “We are well on our way to becoming a one size fits all, characterless organization. Just remember we did this on the backs of owners like Jerry Buss.”