National Basketball League Commissioner Adam Silver, speaking at a press conference during the NBA Summer League in Las Vegas, reported two key areas that were discussed during a recent league meeting.
Silver said NBA owners gave a presentation at the league meeting, with one part a discussion of the progress of individual states in creating sports betting laws in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s removal of the federal ban on sports betting.
The other part of the presentation, Silver said, was “related to the so-called integrity fee or royalty that the league has talked about.” He noted recent failures to add an integrity fee in states like West Virginia and New Jersey. “Frankly, it’s not a place where we’ve made a lot of progress,” Silver said “It’s one of the issues we’re talking to states about.”
Silver added that the other big issue being discussed at the state level is a possible fee related to the data generated by the sport itself. “We’re also very focused on how the data will be used and how we can protect the integrity of the league, and we’ve made more progress on some of those other issues,” said Silver. “I said this during the Finals: In addition to working with the state legislatures, we’re also talking directly to the gaming establishments about entering into commercial deals.”
Silver also called on compensation for the league for its “intellectual property” in general, in the form of the games themselves. He said the NBA is pursuing private agreements with the operators over game data.
“We were asked our view on that legislation—it wasn’t something we were promoting,” he said. “My preference all along has been to have consistent federal framework, but to the extent states were asking us our opinion, we were offering it.
“My view is we should be compensated for our intellectual property, but we can do that directly with commercial relationships with gaming establishments. In fact, even while I’ve been in town the last few days, I’ve had some discussions with some of the operators here about that. So that’s where things stand.”
