Adam Silver Talks NBA Finals, In-Season Tournament, & Expansion w/ Shaq & Chuck

We welcome in the commissioner of the NBA, Adam Silver. Good to have you with us. Thank you, Matt. I was thinking about this. This is your 10th NBA finals as commissioner. Wow. Coming up by quickly. Yeah, that's amazing. I am curious. What have you learned about this job in nearly a decade doing it? Well, you know, it's, it's actually my 30th year. I think when you include the number of years I've been at the league. So I had the opportunity to work with the three hall of famers under David Cern for all those years. So what I've learned is how global this game is becoming. Look, now we're over a quarter of the players, you know, are now born outside the United States. You know, last MVP, five MVPs have been, you know, international players and also just how much this game has grown globally at number two sport in the world after soccer and number one participation sport among kids in the United States. So I think there's so much opportunity ahead of us that, and, and also just lastly, focusing on all these new technologies, so many people now, one thing that certainly wasn't happening, even when I became commissioners, so many people were watching games on their phones, you know, and that opportunity just make it that much more accessible to fans everywhere. We've got a first time NBA finalist here. And of course the Miami heat, a midsize market. And as you know, there's a lot of analysis about what the market sizes and the teams involved means to the NBA, from your perspective, from a business perspective, how much does the matchup matter? The matchup matters, not because of the market size, but because of the excitement around the game. And I think where we're getting to by definition, the teams that are in the finals are the teams that people want to watch because they're the ones who fought through a long regular season through the playoffs to be here. And I think even talking to players, they recognize that it used to be very different. I mean, these guys know that a market could determine what the economics were, what your opportunities are. That's not the case anymore. Um, that it's a global game. Games are all available, available digitally everywhere. And if the success comes from the success on the floor, and so here you have really two midsize markets in Miami and Denver, and, and to me, that's a non-factor it's just, they're the teams that deserve to be here because they won on the court and that's why they're in the finals. The other day you touched on the John Moran situation and you said you didn't want to take away from the NBA finals. How tough was it for you to make that decision based on this new information that you have? It wasn't that difficult. And, and as I said, also that in talking to players association, they agreed. I mean, they, they don't know what we're planning to do yet in fairness to them. They're not signing on to whatever the discipline might be, you know, I don't know what their point of view is going to be, but I think they agreed on behalf of these teams, on behalf of these players, that shouldn't be the focus of attention going into the finals. And of course, commissioner, you go back to the beginning of the playoffs and you think that this would, would have been an unexpected NBA finals, but throughout the playoffs, you've had seven series that were won by the lower seed, including three by the Miami Heat. So could you speak to the state of competition right now in the NBA? Yeah. You know, it's interesting, Grant, this season just measured by, by wins and losses, it was actually the most competitive season in the entire history of the NBA and you had partly because of the addition of the play in tournament, you had 26 teams with 10 days left in the season that were still competing for a playoff spot. And so what we saw here is that, you know, of course the Heat were a playing team. And on the other hand, you have the first seed, you know, in the Western conference, two teams that fought hard all throughout the regular season. You know, coach Spoh said the other day, you know, about embracing the grind of the regular season. They both thought, fought through injuries, struggled at times through the regular season. But I think it speaks volumes about this level of competition. And I think you talk to players around the league and you guys know this, there are no nights off. I mean, maybe once upon a time, and I'm looking at the hall of famers to say whether that was ever the case, that there were nights off in this league. But now every, you know, every team is loaded. There's so much competition out there in the league that, you know, you've got to bring your best all the time. Are you concerned about the great turnover rate of the coaches in the league now, because man, guys who have won championships are like getting fired left and right after a couple of years now. Well, I mean, I'm always concerned about anybody losing their job. I've never, there are friends of all of ours. I'm incredibly empathetic to anybody. Terrible thing to get fired from your job. Having said that three of those head coaches have already been rehired at other teams. And since when you, when you look at it statistically, it's not all that aberrational to where we've been historically, I mean, it may be to your point, teams are quicker to pull the trigger than they used to be. And it was a different set of coaches that were necessarily getting fired. I think what it speaks to is how many teams think they have a legitimate shot to compete. And I think by making that change, that may put them, you know, over the, you know, make that make, help them turn the corner to compete. But, um, the, the good news is I think the great coaches, if they leave one team, they seem to get rehired at another. But that was going to be my follow-up question. Do you like seeing retreads that quickly? Would you like to see some young blood? Honestly, both. I mean, and I think it's interesting that those same coaches that won championships so recently get let go from a team, another team then picks them up. So obviously they didn't go from being a great coach to a bad coach overnight. They recognize the talent there. On the other hand, to your point, you want new coaches to be able to break through the system. And so you also see, for example, in Boston, you see now, you know, in Milwaukee, you know, another new coach, you know, who's, who's come up through the ranks. So you want to see both. I mean, but most importantly to your earlier question, I mean, I feel for guys losing their jobs. We know it's not, I mean, to the outside world, there's a lot of glamor and high pay and stuff that comes with them, but there's enormous dislocation to their families, to them. It's, it's terrible to lose your job. We all know that. Adam, it was recently discovered on social media that one of your referees had a burner account. Uh, could you explain to the fans why that would be a problem if it is a problem at all? You know, I'm, I'm only, I'm going to hold off on that just because we, what we said was he wasn't, you know, Eric Lewis, he wasn't going to work the finals, you know, because we were reviewing the situation and we're going to continue to review it now. Thank you. What about the, um, collective bargaining agreement in principle, um, that has been reported other than the fact that there won't be an interruption in games in the near future. What about that agreement pleases you most? Well, the most thing that, that, that pleases me is that the best part of it, it means we're going to have labor peace through 2030 and this is yet another collective bargaining cycle where we came together with the players and the players association led by Tamika Tremaglio. And we said, let's not go right up to the line where we risk having a work stoppage, even a summer work stoppage. Let's sit down. Let's really focus on it. I think, you know, CJ McComb is president of the players association picked up right after Chris Paul and really focused on it. And we said, we got to compromise. Um, you know, I think the ownership compromise, the players compromise and said, there's nothing more important than make sure we have labor stability and not just on behalf of the players, but I mean, you guys know through whether it's our broadcasting partners, the arena partners, there's literally tens of thousands of jobs that are dependent on this league. And I think, you know, in a difficult economy, people came together and said, let's make sure we keep things going specifically in terms of the agreement. I think I'm pleased we're adding this in-season tournament. I'm excited about that. We added some issues to address, you know, so-called load management, you know, incentivize guys to stay on the floor in the regular season. We know that's an issue. You guys talk about it a lot on air. I think we look for other opportunities to continue to build the league and create more competition. That's what we did through by making some adjustments in the salary cap. I want to ask you, like, I don't understand the mid-season tournament. Can you clarify that to us? Yeah, I think the notion there, it's like taking a page from international soccer where they have other things to compete for, not just in our case, the Larry O'Brien trophy. So we're actually taking, for the most part, a series of games, regular season games, and we're designating those as tournament games, kind of like what they do in European soccer. And so those games will count both for the regular season and for this in-season tournament. And then the four teams that are still standing will come together and we'll go to a neutral site. We haven't designated that site yet. And then they'll play for a separate, you know, in essence, a separate trophy. And it'll be a new tradition. It'll probably take a little bit while to get it going. But, you know, I think what you guys know in this league, it's a long season to play for one championship at the end, and it's not going to replace the Larry O'Brien trophy, but it's our hope that just like in college, there's a lot of, you know, there's a Thanksgiving tournament or a holiday tournament and guys who play in those tournaments, they care about winning. It's not a replacement for the NCAA tournament, but it's to give a little bit more, something more special, a little bit more incentive around those games. So these are the weaker teams or the better teams? Every team is competing. Well, okay. So we already got the low management issue. Okay. Why would I risk, if I'm one of the teams who trying to win the Larry O'Brien trophy, why would I, what's in it for me to play in that tournament? We already having a hard time getting these guys to play. It's absolutely a fair question. We've talked to players a lot about, first of all, all of the games, except for the, well, the games also count towards the regular season. So you have the same incentive to care about your record and there's prize money and it's significant. So there's a financial incentive too, to compete. So you talked earlier, I mean, Nikola Jokic, obviously from Serbia, Joel Embiid won the MVP this year, five of the top eight in the MVP race this year were international players. You touched on it earlier, the growth of the game, but just, if you could elaborate in more detail, the benefits of the international growth here in this league. Well, a couple of things. First of all, just in terms of the talent, if you look now, as I said, you know, we're a quarter of our players going quickly to a third born outside United States. And, you know, whether it's Nikola or Giannis, you know, or Joel, I mean, these are difference makers, you know, it's again, three hall of famers here. There's only so many of those players that exist on the planet who can come in and really make the difference between being a good team and a truly great team. So one is just, and that's who fans want to see the very best players out there. And then there's now where media is going, the streaming services, for example, that are interested in NBA rights are global. And so whether it's in Europe or in Africa, where these players are coming from, they want subscribers. And the fact is that if you are Giannis Atetokounmpo and you're Greek, you know, it only takes one player to turn that country on or Nikola from Serbia, that, you know, even when our games are on at two o'clock in the morning, people are staying up, you know, and setting their alarm clocks because they want to see their countrymen compete. So if you really want to be a global sport and deliver a global audience, you want to have a global group of players. And so that's where it really makes a difference. That leads me to my last question for you, and it has to do with media rights, because that's one of the things on your plate moving forward the next couple of years, there are two years left on the current media rights agreement. You can begin negotiations, I believe next spring, if I'm not mistaken. I know you don't know the particulars of how that's going to play out, but for fans out there, for consumers of the NBA, what is your expectation in terms of the biggest change that they will see after that agreement is struck? I think most importantly, first of all, your parent companies now, Warner Brothers Discovery, like we love our relationship. It's our longest standing media relationship. You guys are all part of, you know, that network. We want to make sure we continue with our great partners. Same thing for Disney, which is ESPN and ABC. But on top of that, I mean, I think a good example is inside the NBA on TNT. It's the greatest sports show on television, Emmy award winning, greatest talent, but increasingly there's limited numbers of people who can see it because not everybody gets TNT anymore. Not everybody subscribes to cable. So if it were up to me, I would want to be on every possible platform. So if somebody isn't subscribing to basic cable and getting TNT and want to just watch it on their phone, then you can just sign up and watch inside the NBA on your phone. And that to me is where our business is going, like partnering with these great media companies, but making games more accessible. And increasingly, I'm sure it's the same for all of us. You know, we're watching programming on your phones, on your iPads. I mean, people are still going to pay for great programming, but right now you can't even get a lot of our games because they're locked up as part of a cable bundle. So that's what it changes. We're going to see. And I think it's going to really benefit live sports because you don't have to be home. You don't have to have a particular package. If you want to watch a game, it's a click away. You know, you'll just like music or whatever else. You'll pay a fair price for it, but it's going to make accessible, including not just the games, but great shows like inside the NBA. Also, Adam, last question. They want us to go, but I need to this question answered with everything going so well. Do you see in the near future more expansion teams like you here, Seattle, you here, Las Vegas? Is that a possibility? It is a possibility. And I think what we've said in the last year is, number one, we want to get our collective bargaining agreement done. So we've done that now. And the other thing we want to understand what our new media rights packages are. And, you know, as Matt said, those negotiations will begin, you know, in earnest, probably in this next spring. Once that's done, we'll turn to expansion. You know, we don't have anything specific in mind right now, but I think it makes sense over time. You know, if you're six, if you're a successful organization to continue to grow, there's no doubt. There's a lot of great cities. We're interested in having the NBA. So just a few things on your to do list. Steve, you want to be commissioner of the NBA? You've got to know all that stuff. Thank you guys. Good to have you with us as always. Thank you, Matt. Enjoy the finals. Adam Silver, the commissioner of the NBA presiding over his tent. I just read that you suspended me for game four or five, six. As I said, my jurisdiction does not extend to Shaquille O'Neal.