Mike Breen advocates for local broadcasts of NBA playoff games

Sports news

Each round of the NBA playoffs will be broadcast nationally, leaving no room for local broadcasters on the call.

By Chad Finn

April 18, 2026

4 minutes to read

If you know Mike Breen only from his national work, he might seem like an unlikely advocate for regional broadcasting.

After all, the play-by-play voice of the NBA on ESPN and ABC has reached the NBA Finals 20 times in his career. There is no more prominent voice in the game of basketball nationally.

But those familiar with the deep roots Breen maintains in New York — where he has called Knicks games since 1991, and on the MSG Network since 1997 — were not surprised that Breen recently spoke out on behalf of the local broadcasters. This wasn’t the first time.

Near the Knicks’ regular season finale Sunday at MSG, Breen lamented that NBA’s new media rights deal With NBC, ESPN and Amazon ending the tradition of broadcasting first-round games on regional sports networks that broadcast their games throughout the season.

This means that an RSN like NBC Sports Boston, the local home of the Celtics, You no longer get a single playoff game broadcast. Every NBA postseason game is now exclusive to its national rights partners.

“I personally think… it’s a bad decision,” Breen said during the broadcast, adding: “I understand that networks pay a fortune to get exclusivity. Obviously, I work for a network, and that’s important to them. But I just think that fans deserve to be thrown a bone once in a while. As far as, you know, letting the home team get a little bit of the first round, one way or another, if there’s any way they can come to some kind of compromise. I’m not feeling hopeful.” So, but it would be nice to have it.

During a conversation on Thursday, Breen explained his decision to speak on behalf of the local broadcast teams.

“I think it’s important to remember that local broadcasts are huge in terms of developing loyal fan bases that will last for generations, because that’s how most of us are raised,” Breen said. “It’s a big part of learning to love our local team.

“The other reason is that you have to warn them. This was the last telecast of the season on MSG. You do a ‘say goodbye, see you next season’ kind of thing and thank everyone. I felt like a lot of fans weren’t aware that would be the case for a local telecast, so I felt like it needed to be said.”

Breen, along with analysts Tim Legler and Richard Jefferson, won the Lakers-Rockets series in the first round. But ESPN will exclusively have the Eastern Conference Finals as well as the Finals, so there’s a reasonable chance the network’s top team will call some Celtics games in the postseason.

Brain admitted that he had already thought about what a A rematch between the Celtics and the Knicks In the second round it will look like – New York Eliminated the defending champion in six matches last season – but he said neither team could look beyond their first-round opponent.

“The second-round rematch would be incredible, but the Knicks are definitely very busy playing Atlanta,” he said. “In the second half of the season after they did that the [Trae Young] commerceThe Hawks have played very well, so it will be a tough game. And Philadelphia, you can’t count them either.

“But I will tell you, the Celtics are very impressive. I thought they were going to be better than people expected just because [Jaylen] brown, [Derrick] white, [coach Joe] Mazzola, and [Payton] Pritchard. These four are some of the most competitive people at their jobs I have ever seen. But I never expected them to be this good, winning 56 games and getting the second seed. This almost sounds silly when talking about Celtics history, but I think it’s one of the great regular seasons in franchise history.

Breen said he enjoyed working with Legler and Jefferson in their first season as a trio. It was Legler, who joined ESPN in 2000 He rose to the #1 broadcast team in the NBA Last August, while Jefferson was in his second season with the team that would make the Finals.

“I thought Legs was great,” Breen said. “This guy, he loves the NBA as much as anyone I’ve ever met. He loves talking basketball, whether he’s on the air or off the air. The chemistry and friendship continues to grow with him and Richard. Richard loves to have a good time. I think he elevates the enjoyment of Legs, the analysis of Legs is off the charts, and he elevates the level of analysis of Richard. It’s been a really great combination.”

…

The latest reminder that sports radio hosts should not be confused with journalists happened this week when Scott Zolak, midday host at 98.5 The Sports Hub, admitted that he had been avoiding talking about… The Mike Vrabel/Diana Rossini scandal Because of his friendship with both of them, especially the Patriots coach.

Zolak is usually not one to shy away from gossip, so he is a hypocrite in that sense. But as a radio analyst for the Patriots, it’s understandable why he would evade a topic his ownership masters would surely like to see disappear.

Surprisingly, co-host Marc Bertrand, who knows how annoying Zolak all of this is, has brought up the topic early and often since. The story became public More than a week ago.