If you’re a fan of the Indiana Pacers or the Minnesota Timberwolves, it’s been a bad week. Both teams are on the brink of being swept in the East and West Conference Playoffs in the NBA postseason tournament. The Dallas Mavericks and Boston Celtics appear to be headed for the NBA Finals.
Yet the really big question for NBA fans of any team remains: What’s going to happen to the team from TNT’s super-popular Inside the NBA program? It’s a big question, as the Association is in the process of negotiating the next mega-deal for TV rights to both the NBA and WNBA. Huge money is on the line, and if TNT is outbid for TV rights, the future of its flagship Inside the NBA program is very much in question.
Meanwhile, it’s business as usual for the crew of Inside. Over the weekend, as the Mavs were going up on the T-Wolves 3-0, there were even more hilarious moments between the two biggest jokers on the show, our man Shaq and Sir Charles Barkely.
It’s the banter, arguments and jokes between those two that make Inside the NBA must-see TV for any hoops fan. There’s already been an outpouring of support for the show, now that it’s starting to look like other networks will bring more money to the table for those coveted TV rights.
But still, the fun stuff continues. If you saw the pregame show before the Mavs / Wolves game in Dallas, Shaq had yet another great Barkley-roast. For this night’s version of Inside the regular crew of O’Neal, Kenny Smith, host Ernie Johnson and Shaq were joined by guest Draymond Green.
Barkley talked about how he intended to go for a walk during the day Sunday, before the game, but that wasn’t going to happen in the scorching Texas sun. Barkley: “’I was taking my daily walk and I made about half a block and I said, abort, abort.”
Barkley said he tries to get in a walk every day, “I walk every day to get peace and quiet by myself but I aborted today.” Shaq took up the conversation without missing a beat: You walked to get what? Pizza and quiet?”
The BIG Podcast with SHAQ
The joke was just the latest to have fans reacting all over social media, and to keep up the call that Inside the NBA stays on the air in one form or another, regardless of which TV network wins the new broadcast rights contract. You can see a sampling of those comments below.
Comments included:
- “The NBA has to find a way to keep this show on the airwaves. It’s just too good.”
- “This has to be saved.”
- They can not get rid of this!!”
- “This is what they’re trying to take from us…I will miss this banter next year.”
- “It will be a tragedy if this show just ceases to exist one day lol.”
There’s not much new to report on those contract talks. Last week, there was word (covered here on the ShaqFu Radio blog), that the NBA is closing in on a series of deals with ESPN, NBC and Amazon over new TV deals worth a combined (and amazing!) $7.4billion per year.
Still, Inside the NBA may survive in one form or another. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver is probably hearing the same fan comments as everyone else. At a fancy dinner in Washington D.C. last week, Commissioner Silver said: “We’re all still talking. Who knows how it’s going to work out?”
The latest insiders are saying ESPN is ready to pay $2.8 billion per year for the league’s most prized set of games, including the NBA finals, a conference final, weekly primetime clashes and the WNBA. NBC, meanwhile, is set to fork out $2.6 billion for the ‘B’ package, which would likely include a show called ‘Basketball Night in America’, airing on Sunday evenings after the NFL season. There’s also a deal in the works with Amazon for about $2 billion, giving the streaming service rights to the In-Season Tournaments, first-round playoff games and the WNBA.