Mark Tatum: NBA Europe clubs will be profitable by Year 3, and the EuroLeague’s 10-year plan ‘doesn’t affect our plans’

On the day the NBA opened its 81st regular season, deputy commissioner Mark Tatum used his yearly session with international media to answer the EuroLeague. The rival competition’s new 10-year business plan, he said, “doesn’t affect our plans,” and the NBA still intends to start rolling out its new European league with FIBA in October 2027.

Tatum also put a number on the pitch the NBA is making to clubs and investors. The average team holding a permanent place in NBA Europe is projected to turn a profit by its third season, he said, and the league expects to send “multi-billions of dollars” back to clubs over the first decade.

“Our model will provide clubs with a much quicker pathway to profitability,” Tatum said. “Our average permanent team in our league is projected to be profitable by year 3.”

Aris Barkas, who covered the session, reported that Tatum described the NBA’s projected payouts as roughly three times what the EuroLeague has promised its own clubs. That plan, made public on Oct. 16, projects €3.4 billion in distributions over 10 years.

Teams ‘soon,’ and no deadline for a deal

Tatum did not give a date for naming the first franchises, but he said the announcements are close. “We definitely expect to begin announcing teams soon as agreements get finalized,” he said, adding that the league is taking care to get the launch right. “This is a historic moment; we have to do it right.”

He would not discuss the talks with the EuroLeague, which turned down the NBA’s first collaboration proposal at its owners’ meeting at Lake Como on Oct. 6.

“I don’t want to disclose any private conversations with the EuroLeague,” Tatum said. “As we’ve said before, we continue to be hopeful that we’ll reach an agreement, but we’re prepared to proceed regardless.”

Asked whether there was a deadline for an agreement, he said the NBA is not waiting on one. “We’re not stopping. We’re moving and proceeding as quickly as we can,” he said. “Our plan is to begin rolling out this project in October of 2027, which is a year from now. So we’ve got a lot of work to do, but we’re moving quickly and we’re not slowing down at all.”

How the NBA’s league would work

Tatum described a pyramid with a merit-based way in for clubs across the continent.

“There will be an established top-tier league, which is the NBA Europe League. There will be a second division,” he said. “The winners of that second division will play into the top-tier league, and then there will be slots for every other club from every other domestic league to be able to play into on a merit-based pathway.”

That lines up with the format the league laid out earlier this month: 16 clubs, 12 of them with permanent places and four spots earned on the court through FIBA’s Basketball Champions League and qualifying tournaments tied to domestic leagues. Barkas reported that the first of those qualifying tournaments is expected at the end of June 2027, though no details are official yet. Our breakdown of NBA Europe’s business case has the full structure.

Tatum said the money will not stop at the 16 clubs. “This will be the largest investment in European basketball in its history,” he said. “We’ll invest in academies, grassroots development, league operations, marketing, arena infrastructure, which is really needed.”

The two plans side by side

	NBA Europe (NBA and FIBA)	EuroLeague 10-year plan
Start	Rollout begins October 2027 (2027-28 season)	Grows from 20 to 24 teams in 2027-28
Teams	16: 12 permanent places, 4 earned on the court	24 in two conferences; 13 shareholder clubs move to permanent licenses
Way in	Second division, plus a merit-based path from domestic leagues	Franchise licenses; 15 binding expansion offers worth about €1.2 billion, new clubs to be named in mid-November
Payouts to clubs	“Multi-billions of dollars” over the first decade, which Tatum put at about three times the EuroLeague figure	€3.4 billion over 10 years
Profitability	Average permanent team projected to be profitable by Year 3	About 40 percent of licensed clubs considered financially sustainable today; goal is all of them by the end of the plan’s first phase

Why it matters

Both sides are now selling the same thing to the same people: long-term security for big clubs in big markets, starting in the same season. EuroLeague chief executive Chus Bueno said on Monday that the “telephone lines are open” but warned that a rival league would be “a disaster,” as we covered in the EuroLeague’s 24-team, €3.4 billion plan. Tatum’s answer was that the NBA is not slowing down for anyone.

The timing is not an accident either. The NBA opened its season with 70 European players on opening-night rosters, and Europe now supplies more than half of the league’s international talent. The next markers are the EuroLeague’s new clubs in mid-November and the first NBA Europe franchise announcements, which Tatum said are coming soon. More league coverage is in Around the league.