nba

The National Basketball Association plans to break a new barrier for U.S. sports leagues by streaming live games to local markets on the Web.

According to a story published Monday by the Sports Business Journal, the NBA plans to negotiate contracts for its member teams so they can stream live games to targeted local online audiences this fall. Bill Koenig, executive vice president of business affairs, told the industry publication: "We hope to have a model in place this season. Our opening up of the rights will certainly be done."

The rights Koenig referred to have been … Read more

Those nice people at ESPN reported this week that Mark Cuban, who I am told, was given a lot of money by Yahoo for some gizmoid or other, is one of the finalists in the bidding to buy baseball's most charming, unlucky, losersome team, the Chicago Cubs.

There will be those on the waggy side of humorous who will claim that he is the perfect person to own the Cubs as his Dallas Mavericks team is one of the most charming, unlucky, losersome teams in the NBA.

(My prejudices. One, I have Golden State Warriors hats and shirts and … Read more

Yahoo and Turner Broadcasting System announced on Thursday a multi-year content and advertising alliance.

Under the agreement, Yahoo Sports will gain access to content from the league sites of the National Basketball Association, the Professional Golfers' Association, and the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing that are managed by Turner Broadcasting. And, in turn, Turner Network will be able to exclusively sell all display, sponsorship, and video advertising in Yahoo Sports' NBA, Nascar, and golf pages on Yahoo Sports.

On Yahoo Sports, Turner will provide live and on-demand video, leaderboards, and editorial content for the NBA, Nascar, PGA Tour … Read more

LOS ANGELES--Never mind the nail-biting lead changes down the stretch, or the dazzling display put on by league MVP Kobe Bryant here at Game 3 of the NBA Finals.

Try also to forget Jack Nicholson holding court from his usual spot at Staples Center. Shrug off the fact that Sylvester Stallone, Eddie Murphy, David Beckham, and Hugh Hefner are all sitting a few feet away. One of the biggest stars in Los Angeles Tuesday night stayed quietly out of sight.

Logging the mind-boggling amount of statistics produced in a single National Basketball Association game is an intense undertaking. And the … Read more

Joy Division isn't the only one that's trying to get the timing just right for a special-edition Zune. Allen Iverson's people are apparently hoping to do the same with their own exclusive version of Microsoft's media player now that his Denver Nuggets have barely secured the last spot in the NBA playoffs.

An etching of the superstar will appear on the back of a limited-edition 8GB Zune packaged with a pair of Reebok shoes called the "Answer XI Zune," according to CrunchGear. Weird.

Only 60 of these special bundles will be sold at a … Read more

Technology and new media made Mark Cuban a billionaire.

Why would the founder of Broadcast.com and the owner of the NBA's Dallas Mavericks force bloggers into a digital ghetto by limiting their access to his basketball team? Isn't he a card-carrying member of the digerati?

By banning bloggers from the Maverick's locker room, that's what he's doing, according to several journalism poobahs, including the Society of Professional Journalists.

The kerfuffle allegedly began when Tim MacMahon, who blogs for the Dallas Morning News, wrote something to the effect that the Mavs needed a new coach. … Read more

Today, we actually get it right! We sucker in Tom Merritt to talk about Amy Winehouse's drunken badness, a guy gets denied an all-star game marriage proposal, unlimited cell phone minutes, and N+, like stick figure lemmings...but for Xbox 360, and Pimp My Ride for Wii. Listen in on the fun!

Listen now: Download today's podcast

OK, folks, here's your chance to show some Playboy bunnies just how good you are at NBA '08.

Wednesday night, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m., at Bloomingdale's locations on Beverly Boulevard and on Santa Monica Boulevard in Los Angeles and on Market Street in San Francisco, the ladies with the iconic bunny tails and ears will be on hand, ostensibly for the launch of a new Playboy line of clothes, but also to play some video game hoops with fans.

Now, you may be a wizard at using your joystick to make Shaq slamdunk over … Read more

Expensive sports rights are a major cost for the United States television industry. Sports also brings huge ad revenue and a male audience that is much prized by advertisers because it's so elusive.

Now the NBA has signed new TV deals that run nearly a decade. This time the buyers get significant rights to Internet distribution of games, highlights and related content. Clearly, this is just another step toward the Internet becoming a full-fledged alternative to typical TV distribution. An ESPN executive said its Web site had a million unique visitors daily during the NBA playoffs earlier this year.… Read more