NBA Deputy Comm. on pandemic recovery: $10B in projected revenue will be 'greatest we've ever had'

Mark Tatum, NBA Deputy Commissioner, joins Yahoo Finance ahead of the 2021-22 NBA season kick-off.

Video transcript

AKIKO FUJITA: Well, the NBA kicks off its 75th season tonight. The league is returning to its regular 82 game format for the first time in two years. Commissioner Adam Silver projecting $10 billion in revenue ahead of tip off. I spoke to Deputy Commissioner Mark Tatum earlier today and started the conversation by talking about how much the NBA's business has returned to pre-pandemic levels. Take a listen.

MARK TATUM: We are all learning to live in this new normal. I will tell you that our revenues this year, the projected $10 billion will be greater and the greatest amount of revenues that we've ever had. So from a revenue standpoint, we're seeing tremendous rebound and growth from our previous record high. And we're optimistic that we'll be able to get there.

I think a big part of that is obviously welcoming our fans back into all 30 arenas for the start of this season. Last season, 29 of our teams welcomed fans into the building towards the end of the season. But this year, we're going to be able to tip off the season with all 30 teams having NBA fans in the building.

AKIKO FUJITA: And the 75th anniversary, I mean, how is the league-- how are things going to look different as you mark that anniversary?

MARK TATUM: We're so excited about celebrating the NBA's 75th anniversary season. You may have seen we launched a new campaign called NBA Lane, which features more than 30 current and former players talking about and showing the history of the NBA over that time. We're going to be announcing a NBA 75 team of the 75 greatest players to play in the NBA. A blue ribbon panel of experts, of media experts and current and former players and coaches and general managers and team executives have voted on who the 75 greatest players are in the NBA to ever play the game. And we will be rolling out those players starting tonight on TNT and then on ESPN.

So over the next three days, we'll roll out those players. So there's been a lot of excitement and debate over who should be on that list and who's not on that list. So fans are going to get very excited about that as well.

AKIKO FUJITA: And certainly, vaccines have been in focus in the run up to the season. Where do the percentages stand right now in terms of the number of players that are vaccinated?

MARK TATUM: Akiko we're very encouraged. 96% of our players are going to be vaccinated on opening night. And as you know, there's about 79% of adults in America have had one vaccine. So we're at 96% of players that are vaccinated.

AKIKO FUJITA: Obviously, the league has not mandated vaccines for players. I know that's a conversation that the league had with the Players Association. Right now, we're just talking about New York and San Francisco where that runs directly in conflict with the cities. But we could see an expansion of the mandates as cities revisit this issue. What's the thinking within the league about this conversation throughout the season? Could you potentially revisit the conversation again to see, in fact, the league may go about-- or to see how the league wants to mandate this.

MARK TATUM: Well Akiko, it's no secret, I mean, our preference would be that everyone be vaccinated with the safe and effective vaccine. And so that was our preference. We would prefer that all of our players were mandated. But we are encouraged, again, that 96% of our players have chosen to be vaccinated.

And so we think that as time goes on and more and more players understand the health benefits and the safety benefits of it, of keeping themselves and their families and their loved ones safe, that they will also go ahead and decide to take the vaccine. So that's certainly our preference. But we are encouraged that 96% of our players have decided to go ahead and get the vaccine.

AKIKO FUJITA: What do you tell players like Kyrie Irving who are still holding out?

MARK TATUM: Well, I'm hopeful that at some point Kyrie does change his mind. And it is his decision, and there are obviously consequences to that decision. But we're hopeful that he will continue to get the information that he needs so that he feels safe and comfortable taking the vaccine for him and for his family.

AKIKO FUJITA: You've obviously got a huge footprint internationally. We've seen more and more international players come into the league. There's still questions around China. And I wonder where the conversations stand in terms of resuming the games on CCTV.

MARK TATUM: Yeah. I will tell you, there is no shortage of games that are available to our hundreds of billions of fans in China. And through our relationship with Tencent, through our relationships with regional sports networks, with China Mobile, our fans have every single game available to them and they've been consuming it. We saw interest in viewership at the end of last season continue to grow and we expect the same to take place again this year. And so we're really serving the needs of our fans by making our games widely available in China. And they're consuming it in record numbers.

AKIKO FUJITA: Let's talk about the viewing experience, because I know the commissioner recently talked about the need to customize viewing experience, especially for a younger demographic who don't necessarily have cable TV. They're not consuming the game in the same way that, for example, I am. What's the conversation within the league about potentially launching a streaming service. There's been rumors about you talking to other leagues like the MLB, like the NHL. What are you considering when you think about how this experience has evolved for fans?

MARK TATUM: Yeah. There's no doubt that the landscape of media and how fans and consumers are consuming content is changing and evolving. We've got great relationships with our current partner's of Disney and AT&T through ESPN, ABC and TNT. And we continue to have conversations with them about how to make sure that our games and our NBA programming and content is available to a wide swath of customers and our fans around the world.

And so going digital is one of those things that we have been doing. We have a League Pass product right now that is available around the world, where all fans can get access to every single NBA game that is broadcast. And so we'll continue to serve the needs of the fans and make sure that we are delivering content to them however they want it and wherever they want to consume it.

AKIKO FUJITA: Is a potential local sports streaming package still on the table? Is that in discussion too?

MARK TATUM: I think we're-- again, we have a wide network of regional sports networks that we work with. All of our teams have those relationships and partnerships. And so we continue to have conversations with the RSN, with our national partners, and looking at all different models of how we-- again, with the main focus being how do we get our content to our fans in the way that they want to consume it and how they're consuming content today.

AKIKO FUJITA: Yeah. Speaking of the way people are consuming it, you've got this partnership in place with Dapper Labs licensing deal for video highlights with NBA Top Shot. Huge success so far one year in. Where do you see that partnership going? And what is that said about some other avenues that the NBA could potentially look at to bring in newer fans into the game?

MARK TATUM: I think it has amazing potential. We've learned so much over the last several months with our partner Dapper Labs and the Top Shot product. I think that these moments, people have such great affinity for these moments that take place, these live moments. And to be able to take those and to create blockchain technology and be able to trade on that and distribute that creates all kinds of possibilities.

I think that there will be opportunities to mirror kind of the physical and the digital. With tickets, for example, where there might be moments from a particular game that you attended that only you get access to because you were at that game when that moment happened. And so those are the types of possibilities that we see going forward with our partner in Dapper Labs in this product.