Camera operator behind the scenes during the game between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Los Angeles Lakers
NBA HQ is offering to help clubs with end-to-end local media solutions or select components of a team strategy.
Local delivery of NBA games this season has teams all over the map in terms of distribution models being used. But as the league begins the 2026-27 season on Tuesday, execs at 645 Fifth Avenue are being flexible in terms of assisting franchises, whether it’s with end-to-end solutions or select components of a team strategy.
“If we want to work with a team and help them all the way from their scheduling trucks and crewing, we can provide that to teams end to end,” said Chris Benyarko, the NBA’s EVP and head of DTC products, technology and operations (as well as SBJ’s reigning Tech Exec of the Year). “Then from a production standpoint, also do that end-to-end from a direct-to-consumer standpoint. So we can completely stand up the direct-to-consumer service, do all the packaging, do the custom support, help them with the marketing, the targeting — we could do all that. But we also realize that each team has different scenarios and different situations they’re in.”
Benyarko also noted that readiness extends beyond the teams to RSNs or other telecast partners so that the NBA can help all sides drive innovation.
Learning lessons
Much of the innovation advice being offered to teams on the digital front comes from the NBA’s enhancements made on the League Pass app, such as alt-telecasts and overlays.
“We’re providing that to teams and their local partners for them to use within their products,” Benyarko said. “Mobile View has been an alt-cast that we’ve done for many years. You’ll see that appear across a lot of the local partners and those telecasts. We’re also launching out kind of a new stats-based focus feed that we’ll also be doing on local.”
The NBA will even be offering to help teams with virtual signage on their telecasts, should they seek such advice.
“Our goal is to just be available to help them as much as possible,” Benyarko said. “Have the teams really be focused on both the marketing and access and content and all those things that make a lot of the more production and technical stuff a little bit more turnkey for them.”
New enhacements
The NBA had a lot of success with its Tap to Watch feature last season in Year 1 of new media-rights deals. Benyarko noted other leagues have reached out for best practices on that effort, as well as the NBA’s broadcast partners who also are in business with other leagues.
But the NBA isn’t resting on its Tap to Watch success of last season. It is introducing a slew of new digital products and initiatives this season for that effort and others, including building out more on TikTok.
“We realized that this is something that we actually need to take global, so we’re getting global coverage coming this year, not just using the U.S. for Tap to Watch,” Benyarko said. “Then we also are taking certain platforms and doubling down and realizing that the Tap to Watch, in terms of mechanism, shouldn’t just be only restricted to the things that we at the league do and what teams do, but we’re also expanding that pretty broadly to also have the creators do it.”
TikTok will be a central part of creator efforts this season, both in the U.S. and abroad. “Lessons that we learned from doing that in the U.S., we can take those to how we apply [efforts] globally,” Benyarko said. “But I would say the mix of the folks that we have even across the different creatives are folks that tend to have larger audiences currently right now within the U.S.”