The 2025 NBA playoffs have been nothing wanting a present to the league’s incoming TV rights holders.

NBCUniversal and Amazon Prime Video executives have to be swooning with each three-pointer that has dropped for the reason that NBA convention semifinals started on Might 5.

The video games have been, for probably the most half, nail-biters – unpredictable, aggressive matchups that seem like sowing the seeds for a brand new wave of NBA superstars and workforce rivalries that ought to play out for years to come back. And that’s the most welcome information for NBCU, Amazon and Disney – the platforms that inked a large $76 billion, 11-year TV rights take care of the NBA that kicks in later this 12 months and runs by means of the 2035-36 body.

Many of the league’s high-wattage, massive metropolis groups – notably the Los Angeles Lakers, Golden State Warriors, Boston Celtics, Miami Warmth and Dallas Mavericks – had been bounced out of the playoffs early on, or didn’t make the minimize. Accidents took a toll this season on high-value gamers like LeBron James (Lakers), Steph Curry (Warriors) and Jayson Tatum (Celtics). That left a void on the prime that has been eagerly stuffed by the league’s most promising underdog groups.

The New York Knicks and Indiana Pacers rushed their solution to the Jap Convention finals. Within the West, the Oklahoma Metropolis Thunder and Minnesota Timberwolves every bested current NBA champions (Denver Nuggets, Golden State Warriors) to clinch their Western Convention slots.

The Pacers haven’t been within the NBA Finals since they had been defeated by the Lakers in 2000. The Knicks had been final there in 1999 after they fell to the San Antonio Spurs. The Thunder made it to the finals as soon as (in 2012) for the reason that workforce relocated to Oklahoma Metropolis in 2008. The Timberwolves have by no means been there.

The semifinals have put the highlight on the hot-shot gamers who’ve powered every workforce to bust by means of expectations. Gamers like Jalen Brunson of the Knicks, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander of the Thunder (named the league’s common season MVP), Tyrese Haliburton of the Pacers and Anthony Edwards of the Timberwolves have undoubtedly proved they’re the following era of NBA superstars, and the 2025 postseason has been their stage.

Scores for the video games have been robust, if not NFL-level spectacular. ESPN final week touted a 12% acquire for its convention semifinals protection total in comparison with final 12 months. Throughout 22 video games, ESPN averaged 4.9 million viewers, making it the second-most watched playoff collection since 2011.

TNT’s protection of the jaw-dropping Recreation 1 of the Jap Convention Finals on Might 21 delivered 6.6 million viewers, peaking at 8.5 million viewers. The Pacers rallied with minutes to go within the fourth quarter to beat the Knicks in additional time 138-135. After the Pacers additionally took Recreation 2, the Knicks turned the tables in Recreation 3 with an identical late fourth-quarter rally from a double-digit deficit that shocked Indiana 106-100.

“That is one other one in all these video games that simply defies description,” Ernie Johnson Jr. of TNT’s “Contained in the NBA” stated Might 25 after the Knicks’ Recreation 3 win.

The vibrancy of the 2025 playoffs has undoubtedly made it a very bittersweet remaining spherical for the executives and manufacturing groups who’ve managed NBA protection for TNT for the previous 35 seasons.

Johnson and his fellow “Contained in the NBA” hosts Charles Barkley, Shaquille O’Neal and Kenny Smith have had no scarcity of fabric to hash by means of in half-time and post-game segments. However NBA rights, together with the “Contained in the NBA” franchise itself, can be gone from TNT when the 2025-26 NBA season begins in October.

The NBA’s transfer from cable stalwart TNT to streaming big Amazon (for one important rights bundle) is symbolic of the bigger disruption throughout the bigger pay TV ecosystem. TNT has an uphill climb forward because it seems to be to fill a Shaq-sized gap in its schedule in only a few months. However for the following few weeks, all eyes are on the shot clock and the scoreboard because the NBA wraps up a memorable postseason.

(Pictured: Shai Gilgeous-Alexander of the Oklahoma Metropolis Thunder)