How NBA Owners Reportedly Could Add $20B in Revenue Not Shared with Players

The NBA's potential expansion teams could be extremely lucrative for current owners.

According to Sportico's Kurt Badenhausen and Eben Novy-Williams, the possible addition of teams in Seattle and Las Vegas, plus the launch of NBA Europe in the fall of 2027, could lead to a $20 billion payout for owners.

About $15 billion of that would be expansion fees for the two new NBA teams and $5 billion in fees from NBA Europe.

What's more, that money would not have to be shared with players as it falls outside of basketball-related income (BRI), the figure used to set the salary cap. That means that each club could get $650 million or more, depending on how high bidding gets for the new teams.

The NBA got one step closer to expansion on Wednesday, as the league's board of governors approved a vote to explore bids and applicants for expansion teams exclusively in Las Vegas and Seattle, according to ESPN's Shams Charania.

Charania noted that multiple officials described expansion as "when, not if." He added that there will be a potential final vote later this year to finalize the transactions to 32 teams, and all rounds of voting would need 23 of 30 governors to vote in favor.