Worldwide Sports News

Rick Welts started his NBA journey as a Seattle SuperSonics ballboy in 1969 at the age of 16, moving up to serve as their public relations director. He spent 17 years in the league office, helping to launch NBA All-Star Weekend and the “Dream Team” marketing program. Welts led the Phoenix Suns and Golden State Warriors for roughly a decade each, and on Jan. 1, he took over as Dallas Mavericks CEO.

Welts is an NBA lifer, and yet, he has never seen what’s happening right now.

“Never had a moment like this where you could be as optimistic as I am,” Welts said in a video interview. “A lot of people are in this league, from an international perspective, from a media perspective, and I really feel like we have the best ahead of us.”

Investors concur, based on a trio of team sales this year in Boston, Los Angeles and Portland that spanned the sport’s economic tiers and drove values up across the board. The average NBA team is worth $5.51 billion, according to Sportico’s calculations, up 20% versus last year and 113% from 2022, when the average was $2.58 billion.

The gains are even bigger at the bottom of the financial table. The “get-in” price, or the value of the lowest-ranked team (Memphis Grizzlies), is $4 billion, up 2.5x from 2022 ($1.63 billion). Investors are bidding up the entry price to own 1/30th of an entity with a new $76 billion TV contract and global aspirations, including building new leagues in Africa and Europe.

The Golden State Warriors lead our NBA team valuations for the fifth straight year at $11.33 billion—only the NFL’s Dallas Cowboys ($12.8 billion) rank higher among the most valuable global sports franchises. The Warriors are followed by the Los Angeles Lakers ($10 billion), who moved up ahead of the New York Knicks ($9.85 billion), the Los Angeles Clippers ($6.72 billion) and the Boston Celtics ($6.35 billion).

Our enterprise valuation estimates measure a control sale price, instead of a limited partnership transaction. Collectively, the NBA’s 30 teams are worth $165 billion, including real estate held by owners and team-related businesses, such as WNBA franchises. If the NBA were a publicly traded stock, its enterprise value would be a tick more than biopharma firm Gilead Sciences.

Team Economics

The average NBA team generated an estimated $408 million in revenue last season, or $12.2 billion total, including non-NBA events at buildings where teams own or operate them. They ranged from $833 million for the Warriors to $301 million for the Grizzlies. Figures are net of revenue sharing that transferred roughly $400 million to low-revenue teams last year, funded by high-revenue teams and 50% of luxury tax proceeds. Ten teams paid a collective $455 million in tax penalties for payrolls that topped the $170.8 million threshold.

Basketball-related income was $10.25 billion last season, hurt by a choppy local media environment and multiple small-market teams reaching the conference finals, which dinged postseason gate receipts. It meant that more than $480 million went back to teams from the escrow fund set aside to make the math work in the system laid out in the collective bargaining agreement that ensures a 51-49 split in revenue between players and the league.

The NBA won’t have any revenue shortfalls this season. The new media contract with Amazon, ESPN/ABC and NBC will bump each team’s TV revenue from $103 million to $143 million. The payouts rise 7% per year on average, resulting in each team on track for $281 million for the 2034-35 season, based on a 30-team league.

Teams get additional shared revenue from sponsorships, international, retail and other league operations. The recent team sales were largely priced based on 2025-26 revenue.

The Warriors continue to be the sport’s most dominant financial power, with revenue 34% higher than the Knicks’ $620 million. The team generates more than $5 million a game in ticket revenue, plus $2.5 million from luxury suites. Its jersey patch deal with Rakuten is worth $45 million a year, and overall sponsorship revenue is nearly double any other team.

Golden State is the rare team that owns its arena—most just operate them. The club also owns the land around the $1.4 billion Chase Center that makes up the 11-acre mixed-use development Thrive City. The club’s related business and real estate value topped $2 billion this year with the WNBA’s Golden State Valkyries tipping off their inaugural season.

The Valkyries made history on the court as the first expansion team to qualify for the playoffs in their first year. Off the court, the club shot to the top of Sportico’s WNBA valuation at $500 million. The team’s per-game ticket revenue was higher than 10 NBA teams last year, including both teams in the NBA Finals.

Eight other NBA teams got a boost from their stakes in WNBA teams, including expansion franchises awarded to Cleveland, Detroit and Philadelphia. The Indiana Fever, a part of Pacers Sports & Entertainment, have been ground zero for the W’s soaring financial standing. During the 2022 season, the Fever averaged 1,776 fans per game, but they topped 17,000 in 2024 after the arrival of Caitlin Clark.

The Fever made the WNBA semifinals this year, despite Clark missing the final two months of the season, after the Pacers faced off against the Oklahoma City Thunder in the 2025 NBA Finals. “To have both teams doing well at the same time is the perfect storm,” Mel Raines, PS&E CEO said in a phone interview.

The crossover between the NBA and WNBA fans is limited in many markets. Raines said the overlap of ticket buyers is between 5% and 10% for her two clubs. “You’re engaging another fan base with the opportunity, a large opportunity, to get them to be a fan of both teams.”

Team Arenas

The team with the biggest financial swing last season was the Clippers, boosted by their first season at the $2 billion Intuit Dome. The team moved from the AEG-owned Crypto.com Arena, where it was the third tenant behind the Lakers and the NHL’s Los Angeles Kings; concerts were also arguably higher than the Clippers in the Crypto.com Arena pecking order.

The Clippers’ Intuit Dome has 46 traditional suites, plus 20 bungalow suites and four courtside cabanas. The cabanas cost $2 million per year, and all accrues to the team, a big step up from Crypto.com where the Clippers’ lease had them receive 12% of suite revenue.

At Intuit Dome, the team pockets all revenue from ticketing, premium, sponsorships and non-NBA events. Clippers owner Steve Ballmer also owns the Kia Forum next door, which is part of our related business value. Overall, the Clippers’ arena and sponsorship revenue jumped an estimated 130% to $330 million. Revenue will jump again this season with a full year of non-NBA events, as well as with the sale of some other premium sponsorship properties.

The Clippers’ 23-year, $300 million sponsorship deal with Aspiration has been one of the NBA’s biggest offseason storylines. Even without the cash from the bankrupt finance firm, the Clippers’ sponsor revenue topped $100 million, which ranked second in the league for sponsorships last season, behind the Warriors.

New NBA arenas are coming in Oklahoma City (2028) and Philadelphia (2030). The Thunder’s $900 million space will be publicly funded—71% of voters approved the deal in 2023. Small markets often have to put up funding towards new buildings or risk losing their franchise. OKC has also soared on the court as the defending NBA champions and favorites to repeat this season. The strong on-court play and impending new arena pushed the value up 22% to $4.34 billion, and its rank of No. 22 is up four spots from 2023.

The 76ers’ owner, Harris Blitzer Sports and Entertainment (HBSE), had been in a holy war with the NHL’s Philadelphia Flyers and Comcast over building a standalone NBA arena in Center City. In January, the two groups reversed course and announced a 50-50 joint venture to build a new arena to house both teams. The deal included Comcast taking an equity stake in the 76ers and paved the way for the WNBA to award Philadelphia an expansion franchise for 2030 that is majority-owned by HBSE.

The Sixers have been tenants at the newly renamed Xfinity Mobile Arena since Josh Harris and David Blitzer bought the team for $287 million in 2011 through a carveout from Comcast Spectacor, which kept ownership of the Flyers and arena. It severely hindered their ability to generate arena revenue, as most NBA teams operate their own buildings. The new venture included a provision that allowed the 76ers to capture a greater share of arena revenue at Xfinity Mobile starting last season. The Sixers’ value jumped 23% to $5.61 billion for a 23.7% compounded annual gain since Harris and Blitzer bought the team.

The Mavericks are also targeting a new arena after 24 years of sharing the American Airlines Center with the NHL’s Stars. The opportunity attracted Welts, who oversaw construction of the Chase Center, as well as Ethan Casson, who took over as Mavs president this summer after serving in the same role with the Timberwolves for nine years. They are scouting sites for a new Mavericks arena and entertainment district, to ideally select one by the end of the first quarter of 2026.

Team Sales

The economics of owning an NBA team have evolved significantly over the past 15 years, thanks to multiple rounds of more owner-friendly collective bargaining agreements and revenue growth via media, sponsorships and ticketing.

Yes, the league faces the challenge of the melting RSN model, which has cut local rights fees in many markets or sent teams to less lucrative over-the-air options. In April, the Knicks agreed to a 28% cut. But the new national media deal pushes the league closer to the NFL’s economic model, with central revenue playing a larger role, as the league sorts out options to centralize more TV rights.

Over the past five years, there have been nine NBA team sales, including pending deals for the Lakers and Portland Trail Blazers. The last time so many teams changed hands was when nine teams were sold between 2010 and 2012. Those agreements priced teams at just over three times revenue.

The current round of transactions kicked off when the Utah Jazz and Minnesota Timberwolves sold for roughly six times revenue. During 2023, owners of the Charlotte Hornets, Dallas Mavericks and Milwaukee Bucks all sold stakes at about 10 times revenue—the Phoenix Suns were the outlier that year with Mat Ishbia paying 13 times the prior year’s revenue for the club.

In March, William Chisholm reached an agreement to buy the Celtics in two stages, which was the stated goal when team ownership hired BDT & MSD and JPMorgan Chase to sell the team. The deal valued the team at $6.1 billion in the first payment, a tick ahead of the Washington Commanders’ 2023 sale for $6.05 billion, the previous most expensive control sale in sports team history.

The first tranche of the deal priced the 18-time NBA champions at 13 times 2023-24 net revenue, although the Celtics won the NBA title that year and grossed $102 million hosting 11 playoff games. The C’s sale was more like 14 times normal-year revenue. The blended value of the Celtics transaction is roughly $6.5 billion.

The record sale price lasted three months. Then Mark Walter agreed to buy the Lakers at a $10 billion valuation, or 16 times revenue. The Lakers, like the Celtics, are tenants in their arena, which dents their ability to drive revenue from concerts and other events. Yet, the Lakers have the richest local TV deal in the sport; their agreement with Charter Communications’ Spectrum brand paid the club nearly $200 million for the 2024-25 season.

Last month, Carolina Hurricanes owner Tom Dundon reached a deal to buy the Portland Trail Blazers for $4.25 billion, or 12 times last year’s revenue. The Celtics’ deal closed in August, while the Lakers’ and Trail Blazers’ agreements still need NBA approval.

What’s Next

Franchise values are being closely monitored by every team because of the impact on the fee in a potential expansion process. The NBA has not expanded since 2004 when Charlotte (then known as the Bobcats) started play, and the other 29 owners split a $300 million payment. This round will be likely be 20x higher.

Expansion was discussed in depth at the July Board of Governors’ meeting in Las Vegas. The presentations walked through the math on the dilution effect to national revenue, as well as the impact on the salary cap.

“The appetite in the [BOG] room I would define more as curiosity and more ‘Let’s do the work,’” Silver told reporters after the meetings ended. “I think we also have this greater obligation to expand, if we do so, in a very deliberate fashion in a way that makes sense holistically for the league. That’s really the best I can do.”

Silver had long said the league would turn its attention to expansion after the latest CBA and media deals were done. The media deal was signed in July 2024, a year after the CBA. The majority of NBA executives Sportico surveyed still expect expansion, but not in the immediate future. Seattle and Las Vegas remain the odds-on favorites, and the price tag is likely to hit $6 billion, although it could be structured where the net present value is lower.

While Seattle and Las Vegas might have to wait a bit longer, the NBA is nearing an expansion to Europe in partnership with FIBA. Deep-pocketed investors are circling the launch of a new league that could include 16 teams, with NBA teams sharing in the expansion proceeds. A fall 2027 tipoff is a real possibility, according to sources familiar with the current plans.

International remains the biggest opportunity for the NBA. The NBA created the Basketball Africa League in 2019 and now wants to sell 12 teams with new home arenas for those franchises. 

This month, the league returned to China after a six-year hiatus. The two games in Macao were a pivotal step in repairing the relationship with the NBA’s second-biggest market. The league also renewed its partnership with Alibaba to be the official cloud computing and AI partner of NBA China. Alibaba platforms have dedicated NBA areas for fans in China to engage with content or shop for merchandise. Alibaba chairman Joe Tsai owns the Brooklyn Nets.

In China, the league has four flagship stores, 45 NBA kids stores and more than 5,000 partner retail stores. The NBA is the most popular sports league in China with 425 million social media followers in China across league, team and player platforms.

“The international opportunity is multiple of what the domestic U.S. sports market is,” Welts said. “The technology will allow anybody, anywhere in the world to consume any NBA game. We just have to figure out an economic model that delivers that in the way that everybody’s getting a fair share.”