Diamond, Amazon, strike deal: Prime Video to stream Bally Sports

Dec 14, 2023; Dallas, Texas, USA; A view of the Bally Sports logo during the game between the Dallas Mavericks and the Minnesota Timberwolves at the American Airlines Center. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-USA TODAY Sports

After weeks of rumors and negotiations, Amazon has officially entered into an agreement to invest in Diamond Sports Group and become the primary streaming home of live games on Bally Sports.

Diamond announced Wednesday that Amazon Prime Video will become the primary streaming partner of Bally Sports, carrying all of the MLB, NBA and NHL teams to which Diamond has digital rights. While Diamond owns digital rights to all of the NBA and NHL teams carried by Bally Sports, that is the case for only five of 11 Major League Baseball teams.

According to the New York Post, the size of the Amazon investment is $100 million. According to previous reporting in the Post, Amazon was initially set to invest $150 million in a deal that would have included all of the MLB teams.

The Amazon deal is part of a broader restructuring agreement that also includes Diamond settling its litigation with parent company Sinclair, which has agreed to pay a $495 million. Diamond filed suit against Sinclair last year alleging that the company had been draining the division of assets with an eye toward its eventual bankruptcy.

All of Diamond’s existing rights deals with NBA and NHL teams are set to expire after this season under separate agreements reached late last year, meaning that any future distribution through Amazon Prime Video will require future negotiations. As pertains to the NBA, there had been an assumption that the end of Diamond’s current rights deals would free the league up to sell those rights to Amazon as part of a broader national media rights agreement. Now Amazon has those rights for a relative bargain and could continue to own them without having to negotiate directly with the league.

For its part, Major League Baseball has resisted the Amazon-Diamond pact, refusing to sell Diamond streaming rights for the six other teams under contract with the company and conditioning discounted rights fees for three teams this season on Diamond relinquishing the digital rights it currently owns. MLB wants to negotiate streaming deals directly with Amazon. It is not clear whether the NBA shares that desire.

All of the agreements announced Wednesday are subject to approval by bankruptcy court.

Tags: diamond sports group FanDuel Sports Network

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Jon Lewis

Jon Lewis has been covering the sports media industry on a daily basis since 2006 as the founder and main writer of Sports Media Watch. You can contact him here or on the social media websites X (Twitter) or Bluesky.

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Comments 8

Jim says:

3 years ago

Any idea how long until the games would transition to Prime Video if approved?
Nate Johnson says:

3 years ago

Just grateful that I’m not in the Detroit market meaning that I can stream the local broadcast on MLB.TV (Tigers fan commenter). I’m not a fan of NBA League Pass. The streaming is very inconsistent. It’s been a problem for a decade plus and I’m surprised there hasn’t been a drastic improvement to it. Love the layout and the in-arena feed during ad break, but for some reason the stream has its issues that I never get from MLB.TV.

As far as Prime video goes, I’m not a fan of it. However, I take responsibility for it. I use an outdated smart TV (it’s a Sharp Aquos, though) and its controller has a rough relationship with the Fire Stick even though it’s still effective. Perhaps with a newer TV the stream would be so much better on Prime Video, but I made no changes (probably be different if I lived in the Detroit market). I hope it is a success between the leagues and Amazon.

When it comes to the NBA, I am curious if this another stepping stone for Amazon to get NBA League and possibly exclusive games as well. I could see the two as tremendous partners in the next deal. It seems like ESPN is leaning heavy towards the NFL in years to come and I would go as far to say that they’re looking to stay heavily committed to the College Football as well even with them having no B1G Ten regular season games in the near future. Going forward the NBA seriously needs to find a partner that is heavily committed to them. ESPN and Turner has shown their true colors that they want to broadcast fewer games and not pay at a much higher rate that Commissioner Silver wants.

Unfortunately the NBA is in a position where they will have to have multiple partners to reach their goal of increase. My suggestions to Commissioner Silver would be is to severe ties with ESPN/ABC, keep TNT as a partner (similar to MLB/TBS partnership), add NBC/Peacock plus Amazon. The smaller number of partnership with complete commitment the better even though it won’t be a 3x profit from the current deal (Silver’s target and goal). While I understand the risk would be is for ESPN to all of a sudden ghost covering anything NBA, I believe the NBA should understand that they can find greater success without ESPN if ESPN will place them a distant 3rd behind NFL and College Football & would only want to find ways to criticize star players and teams when they fail to win a championship instead of celebrating the sport and bring positive energy to it while also being genuine and fair in criticism.
Barry says:

3 years ago

How does Amazon have local NBA/NHL rights for a relative bargain if those contracts effectively end in three months? If I’m the NBA, I would think if the Diamond/Amazon offers for local rights aren’t adequate, I would just put them on the NBA app while also finding local broadcast TV in market similar to what Phoenix and Utah are doing.

Side note: do you see the broader “national game” packages on TNT/ESPN potentially being replaced with “exclusive full league for a given night of the week” offerings. So for example, instead of tonight’s ABC/ESPN double header and eight non-national games, the package turns into “all 10 Wednesday NBA games on ESPN platforms with the bulk of those on ESPN+ (or Max on Thursdays, etc.)?
esl says:

3 years ago

So, Paulsen, just confirm, this will not affect any of the NY area baseball, basketball or hockey teams? They will continue to use their local tv deals?
- Jon Lewis says:
  
  3 years ago
  
  This applies only to the Bally Sports-affiliated teams.
  - Wyatt Smith says:
    
    3 years ago
    
    Do I have to live in a market where balley sports is available in order to receive this service? (Plus will there be a fee on Prime video where I have to pay in order to get the channel?)
    - Jon Lewis says:
      
      3 years ago
      
      Yes, this would be only in-market.
Wyatt Smith says:

3 years ago

So Paulson, what does this mean? (Can I use prime video to stream all of balley sports games) or is it still dependent on where you are at for these rights?