With the cancellation of the first two weeks of the regular season and the loss of 18 nationally televised games on ESPN, NBA TV and TNT, the NBA’s TV partners will now have to look for replacement programming. As we noted yesterday, ABC, ESPN and TNT will lose ad revenue in the wake of its highest rated postseason in the spring.
Turner Sports has issued a statement on the cancellation of six games on TNT in the first two weeks of the regular season:
Turner Sports NBA Lockout Statement:
Like NBA fans our hope is that a favorable resolution is reached for both sides. We believe in the strength of the NBA brand and hope for an outcome that preserves as much of the 2011-12 season as possible.
Right now, Turner is in a holding pattern. Being the operator of NBA TV and producing games for TNT, this is a big hit. We’ll see how long this goes and what type of hit the NBA takes in losing games for possibly the entire 2011-12 season.
