With ten months to go before its first broadcast, Amazon is formalizing the first additions to its NBA roster.
Amazon Prime Video has signed former NBA players Dirk Nowitzki and Blake Griffin to join its NBA studio team next season, Andrew Marchand of The Athletic reported Sunday. The streamer’s discussions with Nowitzki and Griffin had been previously reported.
The pair is set to work alongside host Taylor Rooks, whose selection was also previously reported. Neither Nowitzki nor Griffin has ever worked as an NBA analyst, save for the former’s occasional guest appearances on local Mavericks broadcast.
Amazon is also said to be in talks with Dwyane Wade for a studio or game analyst role. Wade served as a game analyst on NBC’s Olympics coverage last year and previously was a studio analyst for TNT.
One potential wild card could be TNT NBA analyst Charles Barkley, who said last month that he had been in talks with Amazon and NBC about a potential role — despite having reached an agreement last year to remain exclusive to TNT Sports. Barkley has expressed misgivings about TNT’s deal to sublicense its “Inside the NBA” studio show to ESPN next season and broader displeasure with management at Warner Bros. Discovery, but it is far from clear that his talks with other networks are anything but a leverage play.
It is also far from clear that Barkley — a TV analyst for a quarter-century — would fit with an Amazon studio consisting largely of newcomers.
Unlike ESPN and NBC, both of whom have long-established basketball and studio infrastructure, Amazon is building its NBA broadcast entirely from the ground-up. On the play-by-play side, the streamer is said to have selected Ian Eagle for its lead team and is widely expected to pursue Kevin Harlan for a secondary role.
