The latest surge in coronavirus cases among professional athletes is once again forcing television networks to rearrange their schedules on the fly.
TNT, a unit of AT&T Inc.’s WarnerMedia, was slated to air a National Basketball Association game between the Washington Wizards and Brooklyn Nets on Tuesday. But because the Nets have too many players sidelined due to the virus, the game was postponed, and TNT has decided to show the Indiana Pacers’ game with the Miami Heat instead.
TNT will have fewer alternatives to replace Wednesday night’s National Hockey League matchup between the Edmonton Oilers and Los Angeles Kings: The NHL has decided to suspend all of its games through Dec. 26 in an effort to contain the sudden rise of the highly transmissible Omicron variant of Covid-19. TNT said it would show entertainment programming instead on Wednesday night.
Overall, the NBA, NHL and National Football League had moved to postpone a combined 60 games as of Tuesday. Such an upheaval hasn’t been seen since March 2020, when all leagues suspended their seasons almost overnight when the virus first struck the U.S. At the time, sports broadcasters scrambled to fill the void, opting for a mix of reruns, analysis and coverage of the virus’s impact on sports leagues. A documentary about Michael Jordan’s final season with the Chicago Bulls even became a ratings hit.
Lee Berke, a sports-media consultant, says sports broadcasters are in a much better position this time around.
“As unnerving as this is, it’s not the same this time because there’s tools in place to protect people and reduce the impact of the virus,” he said. “If the games are made up, there’s no harm and no foul. Advertising units will be made up for the distributors and sponsors.”
TV networks and leagues say they are monitoring the spread of the virus closely and making appropriate adjustments when needed.
“We are in regular communication with our league partners, including the NHL, to understand and adapt to the competition and scheduling decisions they make,” ESPN said in a written statement. ESPN, a unit of Walt Disney Co. , has rights to NBA, NHL and NFL games.
The NBA informed teams this week that it could still juggle the schedule for Christmas, the league’s highest-profile day of the regular season, in response to the more than 80 players who are currently sidelined by Covid-19 protocols. Some of the 10 teams featured in marquee games on ESPN and ABC are battling outbreaks and could be missing their biggest stars.
When the league scheduled the Brooklyn Nets and LeBron James’s Los Angeles Lakers, ABC—which like ESPN is owned by Disney—was expecting a potential NBA Finals preview in Saturday’s prime-time slot. But the Nets have been decimated by Covid-19 over the past week. They had two games postponed after Kevin Durant, James Harden and the unvaccinated Kyrie Irving were ruled out, and it isn’t clear whether those players will be available for the Lakers game.
Two Brooklyn Nets games were postponed after several players, including forward Kevin Durant, were ruled out.
Photo: Al Bello/Getty Images
With 20 teams off on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, the NBA has a flexibility to manipulate the schedule in its television partner’s favor. For example, the depleted Nets could be replaced by a team like the Los Angeles Clippers or the Denver Nuggets, because both will be in Los Angeles for their game the following night.
The NFL has had to postpone three games so far. One was eventually played on Monday night, and the other two were scheduled to be played on Tuesday night. A person familiar with the league said the NFL doesn’t expect the playoffs or the Super Bowl to be delayed at this point.
The NHL said it expected games to resume on Dec. 27. The Winter Classic, the NHL’s annual outdoor game, is still slated to take place on New Year’s Day, and will air on TNT. However, the league and its players’ union agreed to drop out of the coming Beijing Olympics, people familiar with the matter said.
ESPN and WarnerMedia’s Turner Sports have spent billions of dollars to air NHL games over the next seven years. Earlier this year, each network reached deals to air NHL national games on their TV networks and streaming services. Similarly, ESPN and Turner Sports shell out billions annually to air NBA games nationally.
The Cleveland Browns faced the Las Vegas Raiders on Monday in a game that had been postponed from Saturday after some Browns players tested positive.
Photo: Ken Blaze/USA TODAY Sports
Last year, when a significant number of professional sports games were never played, pay-TV providers moved to distribute rebates. Some of them, including Comcast Corp. , are still giving rebates to customers that date to the missed NBA, NHL and Major League Baseball games of 2020. Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc., which owns the largest number of regional sports networks, said last month that $201 million of rebates remain to be paid.
Losing professional sports games—especially the highly rated NFL and NBA—translates into lower ratings that could harm the TV networks’ advertising sales. Advertisers pay hefty sums of money for spots during live sports, considered to be the glue that holds the pay-TV package together.
“The entire value chain is driven by live games, so games not played will probably mean prorated subscriber fees from distributors to [regional sports networks], and in turn, to teams,” said sports-media consultant Patrick Crakes.
“That said, I’m more than sure all the game inventory will air, which has been the case so far. The devil here is in just how big this gets.”
—Ben Cohen contributed to this article.
Write to Lillian Rizzo at [email protected]
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