Fubo made a late pitch over the past week to the 13 NBA teams that have exited Main Street Sports Group, offering a hybrid streaming model and rights fees likely in the vicinity of $10 million or slightly below. The Disney-owned company pursued the Hawks, Hornets, Cavaliers, Pistons, Pacers, Clippers, Grizzlies, Heat, Bucks, T'Wolves, Thunder, Magic and Spurs.
A source familiar with the bidding said the move "sort of came out of nowhere." Fubo's plan would let it negotiate direct-to-distributor linear deals with cable companies such as Comcast and Charter while also streaming games on its own digital platform, a structure aimed at giving the teams both traditional carriage and direct-to-consumer reach.
The bid matters now because the teams are trying to line up their next local media homes quickly. By Wednesday, Fubo had declined comment, and the NBA denied that there was any Friday deadline, even though decisions on the 13 teams could crystallize as soon as Friday and teams believed they could begin signing new linear and streaming deals next week.
Fubo also built a one-time opt-out into its pitch, allowing the arrangement to be revisited after next season or beyond if the NBA launches its national platform. The league has denied making any request that teams include an opt-out in pending local streaming deals, underscoring the tension between what clubs want now and what the NBA may want later.
The backdrop is a scramble among teams that just left Main Street Sports Group. Most are also weighing offers from DAZN and Victory+ or considering local over-the-air channels through Gray, Scripps or Nexstar, while the NBA would prefer Amazon and YouTube TV for a national streaming RSN. If those platforms do not commit, the league could delay an aggregated streaming platform until the 2027-28 season, which is also when Fubo hopes to become a candidate for that centralized hub.
For now, the company has put itself into a race it had not been expected to join. The question is not whether Fubo can talk its way into the deal sheet; it is whether any of the 13 teams decide its offer is the right bridge between the local TV model they are leaving and the streaming setup the NBA still wants to build.
