NBC prepared to pay $2.5B a year for NBA games, WSJ reports

Comcast’s (CMCSA) NBCUniversal is preparing to offer roughly $2.5B a year, on average, to air a package of National Basketball Association games, as competitor Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) seeks to maintain those rights, the Wall Street Journal’s Joe Flint, Amol Sharma, and Isabella Simonetti report, citing people familiar with the situation. Warner’s TNT is one of the Association’s longest-running television partners and has paid an average of $1.2B per year under its current agreement, the author says, noting that Warner was unable last week to reach a new contract with the NBA before an exclusive negotiating window expired.