The NBA and National Basketball Players Association announced Wednesday night they have ratified the recently agreed-upon new collective bargaining agreement. Both sides came to the new agreement in the early hours of April 1, shortly after the deadline for both sides to opt out of the current agreement had expired at midnight March 31. I

The new CBA will go into effect on July 1st and remain in place until at least the end of the 28-29 season.

The CBA includes provisions to limit the ways big spending teams can build their rosters, aimed at franchises like the Golden State Warriors and Los Angeles Clippers.

The deal also brings in the in-season tournament.

The NBA last had a work stoppage in 2011 when the owners increased their share of Basketball Related Income from 43 percent to 49 percent.

Since the 2011 collective bargaining agreement, players were guaranteed to receive between 49 percent and 51 percent of basketball related income. In every season, except for the 20-21 season due to the COVID-19 suspension of the season, players received 51 percent.

In the new CBA, players are expected to receive 51 percent of BRI throughout the agreement under the negotiated formula for "forecasted BRI."

As part of the 2011 lockout, players saw their share of BRI reduced from 57 percent to the 49 percent to 51 percent band.

The NBA is phasing in its new second luxury tax apron over a two-year period, sources tell John Bollinger of The Athletic. 

The Los Angeles Clippers and Golden State Warriors are both about $40 million above the line currently and are locked into payrolls around the same level for next season. Both teams would struggle to lower their payroll much without substantially making their roster worse.

The penalties for teams who go into this tax will be so draconian that it will essentially act as a “soft hard cap.” Teams will rarely if ever go beyond it.

The Boston Celtics, Milwaukee Bucks, Dallas Mavericks, Los Angeles Lakers and Phoenix Suns are all over the $17.5 million line this season, but each of them could fairly easily get below it. Only the Bucks and Suns face any possibility of issues with the line next season.

Teams above the second apron will have no midlevel exception, not even the taxpayer MLE.

From the opening tipoff on Oct. 18 through the close of the 22-23 NBA regular season on April 9, local NBA deliveries were up two percent compared to last season, giving regional sports networks their highest ratings in five seasons.

When weighted by market size and duration, the RSNs averaged 39,801 household impressions per NBA game, topping the deliveries for TNT (26,342) and ESPN (20,531). This means local sports networks are drawing a larger crowd of NBA fans than their larger TV rivals.

The Golden State Warriors this season averaged 132,286 households per game on NBC Sports Bay Area, eclipsing the 42,309 local households that tuned into TNT’s competitive coverage. 

The NBA and NBPA have agreed to major changes to the draft process as part of its new collective bargaining agreement.

Beginning in 2024, all invited players will be required to attend and participate in the NBA draft combine or be ineligible to be drafted until the "first subsequent draft for which the player attends and fully participates."

Participation will include league medical examinations, sharing of medical history and biomechanical and functional movement testing, as well as strength and agility testing, shooting drills, performance testing and anthropometric measurements. 

This represents a significant shift in favor of NBA teams that have long lobbied for this rule change. Agents of elite prospects have regularly strategized to keep medical information away from franchises they have perceived as less appealing.

Players who are physically unable to participate, because of playing with a FIBA club still in-season, family tragedy, the birth of a child, or an injury, as determined by the medical director of the combine, will be required to complete components at a later date. 

The second major change that will be instituted in the new CBA involves doing away with automatic eligibility for high school or collegiate players who sign professional contracts with entities such as G League Ignite, Overtime Elite (OTE) or the Australian NBL.

In the past, players who signed with such entities would be automatically eligible for the subsequent NBA draft, regardless of whether they were interested in doing so or not, provided they were turning 19 in that calendar year.

Beginning in the 24-25 season, teams that are below the minimum salary floor on the first day of the regular season will not receive a luxury tax distribution at the end of the season.

For example, the San Antonio Spurs would have forfeited $15.2 million this season.

Over the past few years, teams have remained under the minimum salary floor until the trade deadline in order to maximize their trade optionality such as being incentivized to take on dead money by other teams attempting to get under the luxury tax.

If a team goes over the second tax apron twice over a four-year span, their first round pick will be dropped to the end of the first round. 

The rule goes into effect at the start of the 24-25 season.

Teams that go over the second tax apron even once will be unable to trade their first round pick that is seven years out.

If teams stay under the second apron in three of the following four seasons, the pick becomes unfrozen.

Comcast’s NBCUniversal wants an NBA package including playoff games for its broadcast network and regular-season games for its Peacock streaming platform, according to CNBC. The interest is likely mutual between the NBA and NBC.

Under their current rights deals, incumbents ESPN and TNT pay a combined $24 billion, or $2.6 billion annually. ESPN and TNT have an exclusive negotiating window with the NBA.

Comcast chairman/CEO Brian Roberts has a rivalry with Disney's Bob Iger.

“Brian Roberts and Bob Iger are personal rivals — as well as business rivals,” noted Matthew Belloni, former editor of The Hollywood Reporter turned co-founder of Puck News. 

“If they can make a smart choice for their own company — and screw over the other guy — they are going to do it.”

There have been reports that Disney could spin off ESPN, but Iger has resisted that notion. The rising costs of live rights could make it difficult for Disney to continue to keep ESPN.

“There may come a time when [Iger] is essentially forced to sell [ESPN] by the economics of that business,” warned Belloni. “If the rights fees keep going up, the cable fees keep going down, and the streaming business does not mature in the way they hope it does, then it just doesn’t make sense for them to stay in that business. 

“But I think Iger wants to stay in that business.”

As part of the next collective bargaining agreement, NBA players will have an increased flexibility to invest alongside team owners in businesses outside of the NBA.

The previous five percent safe harbor limit is being more than doubled to 12.5 percent.

Players can also invest directly in independently owned WNBA teams or those not owned by NBA owners. 

Investments by the player and his family cannot exceed four percent, and he can only invest in one team.

WarnerBros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav said this week that the company has a "building attack strategy" on sports and news, which was in contrast with his previous statement that TNT doesn't "have to have the NBA."

A source tells FrontOfficeSports, however, that nothing has fundamentally changed about the company's approach.

The company is primarily interested in retaining sports rights with a broad appeal, including those of the NBA.

TNT wants to retain its position as a broadcaster for top regular season and playoff games for the NBA.

TNT averaged 1.4 million viewers for its NBA broadcasts in the most recent season and had the top five cable NBA telecasts.