A P.R. Crisis for the Zaz Era

david zaslav
Zaz, with his generous salary and Bob Evans pad, hardly fits the bill of a populist warrior. Photo: Drew Angerer/Getty
Dylan Byers
July 26, 2024

On Wednesday, to no one’s surprise, National Basketball Association Commissioner Adam Silver formally rejected David Zaslav’s attempt to exercise Warner Bros. Discovery’s matching rights for a package of games that had been claimed by Amazon. Minutes later, the league announced that it would proceed with its deals with Amazon, Disney, and NBCUniversal—a $77 billion win for the NBA over 11 years—while WBD’s lawyers began finalizing a breach-of-contract lawsuit they would eventually file on Friday. The insider consensus was that Zaz’s failure to keep the NBA on TNT was yet another example of hapless mismanagement, and his decision to sue the league would only make matters worse. What better way to appeal to other potential partners than signaling that, in addition to being saddled with debt and tethered to a declining linear business, you can also be a litigious sore loser?