What's Wrong with the NBA: Former Warriors Owner Explains
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All right, now we're going to move on to the 2025 biggest business loser predictions in 2024. Shamath said pro sports teams because they hit peak valuations. That's looking like a pretty good prediction. I would take the other side on pro sports teams. It feels like that market is about to be institutionalized and funds are going to start buying pro sports teams. Okay. That ultimately and ultimately capital markets have way more resources than kind of the wealthy individuals who've done it for now.

to date. So I just think it's the amount of money that can go after pro sports teams is about 10x, 100x. I think you're totally right. The reason I said that last year was it was pretty clear to me at the time, and the NBA was the canary in the coal mine, that there was a viewership problem in professional sports. And specifically in the NBA, the game has devolved into essentially rebounds and dunks or three-pointers.

And the issue with that is that it becomes just meaningfully less interesting to watch. At the same time, because of the fact that the TV deals are really what determines the discounted value of these sports franchises, the TV deal was so enormous that it creates no reliable rivalries anymore. Because people will hopscotch teams almost every year because the compensation that they can get is just so obscene, quite honestly.

And I think what happens is sports will have a decent run until the next TV deals get done. And I think if you, for example, take pharma ads outside of TV, so like that pool shrinks, if you have less viewership, and so you can sell the remaining ads less effectively because there's just fewer of them, and then there's fewer buyers and it shrinks yet again, then the dollar pool will

that the television networks and the streamers are going to be willing to pay for sports will go down. And the group that will be the most price sensitive are exactly who you said, Gavin, meaning the non-trophy buyer. So like, you know, when I bought into the Warriors, I bought it purely as a trophy asset and I was price insensitive. But I agree with you that now that you have the PE firms on the cap tables of these sports franchises,

Those folks are all DCFs. Those folks are all Excel models. I don't think that they're buying things for emotion. I don't think they've grown up thinking, I want to own this thing, not using institutional LP dollars. So I just think that's why I said that in 24. So I just wanted to- On behalf of Phil Hummuth and I, we appreciate you made that vanity investment for the number of times we got to sit in your court side seats.

Yeah, because I never went to the games. I never went to the games. I should have gone to more games. I went to your games and almost got thrown out of your seats. I got a red card one time. It's true. Is it true? You did? Oh, you don't call that story? I got a call. I got a call. I think it was from the Warriors or it's from the NBA. Something to the effect of Chamath. This guy that was sitting in your seats was almost kicked out. And I said, excuse me, because I knew it.

It was the Knicks game, in fairness. And he was like jawboning our own players. I was getting into it with Bogut and with David Lee because I told Steve Kerr, listen, you're up 30 on my Knicks. Sit these guys down. This is Bush League. What if Steph Curry gets hurt out there? And Bogut told me to shut up on Andre Iguodala. Bogut told him to basically go pound sand. He basically did. It was the funniest thing ever, Gavin. This is what happened.

Bogut's one of our friends and he's one of our good friends. So that's why it's so funny. But they come over, Friedberg, and they tap you on the shoulder. I'm with my wife. She's mortified. And the guy hands you a card. And the card says, you've been warned one time and one time only about abusive behavior. If we have to warn you one more time, you will be escorted out. So I look at the guy and I say, but, and he goes, read the card. I read the card. I say,

He goes, give me a thumbs up. That was it. I never. That was it. You're not supposed to. Then three years later, I'm sitting in the same seats. I'm interacting with Draymond during the finals games and then everybody's hokey dokey with it. When you say interacting, what do you mean when you say interacting? Hold on. Gavin wanted to make a point about what I just said. No, I just want to just come back to Chamath because for sure these private equity guys are DCFs. The NBA has been terribly managed. I think even LeBron said they have a big problem.

you know, and I'd separate the NBA is the worst managed NFL is probably the best managed. But the one kind of counterpoint I would say on the TV rights is Google bought Sunday ticket and are extremely happy with it. Amazon and Netflix also bought, you know, both bought NFL games and are really happy with them. And so I just think those three companies, it doesn't really matter to them if pharma ads go away.

In 18 months, you're going to be able to dynamically create an ad for each individual person and show it to them. And if you're a high value user that Google knows that you're about to book a vacation, they'll dynamically generate whatever hotel destinations you want and show click here. So I just think

So sports, as long as they command the eyeballs that they do, and for sure, if the NBA doesn't fix it, the value of those franchises will start to decline. But just the fact that all of the biggest tech companies are so happy with the sports kind of rights that they bought, they're going to buy them all.

Every sport will go to one of those companies. I can't understand, Gavin, maybe you're closer to this, but why wouldn't Apple, Amazon, or Google just back up the truck to the NBA and say, we'll take the whole thing, and then anybody who's got an iPhone gets the NBA for free, and then everybody else has to pay, and they figure it out in the back, and they lose $5 billion, they make $2 billion. Who cares? It's a rounding error for Apple.

I agree. And they, you know, I mean, they all, all except for Apple, really. And Apple, they have, I think, an MLS deal, but they all kind of stuck their toe in the water. And I think they feel like, wow, the water's warm. Let's dive in. Okay. Yeah. And the new deal is an 11-year deal for the NBA. So these things don't come up that often, but we'll see over time. Maybe somebody will buy one of these media companies and inherit them.