On May 22, 2025, Trey Hendrickson, the Cincinnati Bengals’ All-Pro defensive end and a finalist for NFL Defensive Player of the Year, requested a trade. The Bengals denied it. He complained publicly that the team had stopped communicating. He vowed not to play under his current contract. The result: Hendrickson remained a Bengal.
Compare that to any NBA superstar’s trade request in the past decade. Kevin Durant, Anthony Davis, James Harden, Kawhi Leonard, Paul George. Every one of them either got traded to a preferred destination or forced significant franchise decisions within a single offseason. The mechanism that makes this possible is not just popularity or leverage. It is money, contracts, and a CBA specifically built to give players structural power.
The BRI Split: Where Player Power Begins
The foundation of NBA player power is a number: 51%. Under the current CBA, which runs through the 2029-30 season, NBA players receive 51% of Basketball Related Income. BRI is a broad definition that includes gate revenue, national and local broadcast rights, arena naming rights, merchandise, and, as of the 2023 CBA, team and league licensing revenue for the first time.
That 51% guarantee is enforced through an escrow system. Teams withhold 10% of player salaries during the season. At year end, actual BRI is calculated. If players received more than 51%, the escrow covers the difference. If they received less, the escrow is returned. In practice, as revenues have grown, most of the escrow is returned to players annually.
The NFL’s equivalent number is 48% to 48.5% of all revenue, enforced through a hard cap with no escrow mechanism. NFL players get their percentage, but the hard cap means no team can overspend to retain a star, no exceptions exist for keeping franchise cornerstones, and non-guaranteed contracts are standard rather than exceptional.
How the revenue split compares across leagues:
- NBA: 51% of BRI guaranteed to players, soft cap with luxury tax allowing overspend
- NFL: 48-48.5% of revenue, hard cap, no exceptions to exceed team limit
- NHL: 50% of revenue, hard cap similar to NFL structure
- MLB: No salary cap, no fixed player revenue share percentage
The $76 Billion Deal and What It Means for Salaries
In July 2024, the NBA signed the largest media rights deal in league history. Disney (ESPN/ABC) pays $2.6 billion annually, NBC pays $2.5 billion annually, and Amazon Prime Video pays $1.8 billion annually for an 11-year agreement running through the 2035-36 season. The previous nine-year, $24 billion deal suddenly looked modest by comparison.
The direct player impact is structural and immediate. The CBA ties the salary cap to BRI. As national television revenue nearly triples, BRI rises proportionally, and the cap follows. For 2025-26, the salary cap jumped 10% to $154.6 million, the maximum annual increase allowed under the CBA’s cap-smoothing mechanism designed to prevent one-year salary spikes. That 10% ceiling will continue annually as the new TV money flows in.
What a Rising Cap Means for Individual Players
Jayson Tatum signed a five-year, $315 million supermax extension with the Boston Celtics in 2024, the largest contract in NBA history at signing. That record lasted less than a year. As the cap rises 10% annually, the supermax percentage of the cap rises with it, meaning every new supermax signed in 2026, 2027, and beyond will exceed $315 million in nominal value.
Stephen Curry earned $55.8 million in 2024-25, the highest salary in the NBA. Under the new media deal’s cap trajectory, multiple players will earn $60 million or more annually before the decade ends. The average NBA salary of $11.9 million in 2024-25 already exceeds every other major American sports league on a per-player basis, and the structural direction is upward only.
NBA salary cap trajectory under the new media deal:
- 2024-25 cap: $140.6 million
- 2025-26 cap: $154.6 million (10% increase)
- Projected annual increase: 10% maximum per CBA smoothing rules
- Player salaries projected total (2023-30 CBA term): $45-50 billion collectively
- Average salary (2024-25): $11.9 million, highest per-player of any major US league
Soft Cap vs. Hard Cap: The Structural Difference
The NBA’s soft cap is the mechanism that makes superteams, supermax extensions, and star retention economically possible. Teams can exceed the $154.6 million cap through a series of exceptions. The Larry Bird Exception allows teams to re-sign their own players above the cap, which is specifically why LeBron James could always return to the Cleveland Cavaliers at a premium, or why the Golden State Warriors retained Stephen Curry through his peak years.
The NFL’s hard cap is its exact opposite. The 2025 NFL cap was set at approximately $255 million per team, higher in absolute terms than the NBA cap. But no team can exceed it under any circumstances. No exceptions exist for keeping franchise quarterbacks beyond the cap constraints. When a contract becomes too expensive relative to cap value, teams cut players outright, regardless of performance or legacy.
Why NFL Stars Can’t Force Trades
Non-guaranteed contracts are the NFL’s most significant structural tool against player power. The majority of NFL contracts beyond the signing bonus are not guaranteed. A player signed to a five-year, $100 million deal may have only $30 million fully guaranteed. The team can cut that player after year one if performance drops or if cap management requires it, owing nothing beyond the guaranteed portion.
In the NBA, contracts are almost fully guaranteed from day one. A player signed to a four-year, $200 million deal is owed that money regardless of performance, injury, or team preference. This guarantee is what gives NBA players negotiating leverage. When Anthony Davis requested a trade from New Orleans in 2019, the Pelicans could not simply sit on his contract indefinitely. The trade happened, delivering Davis to the Lakers, because the guaranteed money created mutual pressure to resolve the situation.
NFL players under non-guaranteed deals have no equivalent leverage. A franchise can absorb a player’s unhappiness, deny a trade request, and release him if the relationship deteriorates enough. Trey Hendrickson in 2025 is the same situation as dozens before him.
The Supermax: How the NBA Rewards Star Loyalty
The supermax contract is the NBA’s most powerful retention tool and the clearest expression of player-driven economics. Introduced after Kevin Durant left Oklahoma City for Golden State in 2016, the supermax allows a team to offer its own star player a contract worth 35% of the salary cap, more than any other team can offer. The only way to qualify is through individual performance: MVP awards, All-NBA selections, or Defensive Player of the Year honors.
Jaylen Brown’s five-year, $304 million extension in 2023 was a supermax. Jayson Tatum’s $315 million extension in 2024 exceeded it. Both were achievable only because the Celtics, as their original teams, could exceed what any competitor could offer. The economic design is explicit: reward star players with money tied to their individual merit, not just market dynamics.
Recent supermax contracts and their values:
- Jayson Tatum (2024): 5 years, $315 million with the Boston Celtics
- Jaylen Brown (2023): 5 years, $304 million with the Boston Celtics
- Nikola Jokic: 5 years, $264 million extension with the Denver Nuggets
- Giannis Antetokounmpo: Extended multiple times, each reflecting supermax percentage of rising cap
- Stephen Curry (2024-25 salary): $55.8 million, built on successive supermax extensions
No equivalent structure exists in the NFL. The closest analog is a franchise tag, which allows teams to retain a player at a one-year salary equal to the average of the top five contracts at his position. But the franchise tag is a team tool, not a player tool. It prevents a star from reaching open-market free agency, not the reverse.
The NBA CBA vs. the NFL CBA: Power Balance
The 2023 NBA CBA, which runs through 2029-30, expanded BRI further than any previous agreement. For the first time, team and league licensing revenue was added to the BRI calculation, worth an estimated $160 million annually. Complimentary tickets, watch parties, barter expenses, plaza naming rights, and equity transactions all now count toward the player revenue share. Players were projected to earn between $45 billion and $50 billion collectively over the seven-year term.
The NFL’s 2020 CBA, running through 2030, extended the season to 17 games and added a 17th regular season game against player union resistance. The trade the NFLPA accepted: modest revenue share improvements and a slightly higher minimum salary floor. The fundamental hard cap structure remained unchanged. NFL owners negotiated from a position of strength precisely because of revenue sharing among themselves.
Why NFL Owners Have More Structural Power
NFL franchises share national television revenue equally across all 32 teams. Every team receives an equal portion of the broadcast deal regardless of market size, win-loss record, or star power. This revenue equalization means small-market NFL teams in Green Bay or Jacksonville are financially stable without depending on superstar players to drive local revenue.
NBA teams do not share local revenue equally. The Golden State Warriors generated $781 million in revenue in 2023-24, while the Memphis Grizzlies generated $258 million. That gap means NBA franchises in large markets depend on superstar players to drive attendance, local broadcast deals, and sponsorship. That dependence creates player leverage that NFL teams structurally do not have.
Revenue gap between largest and smallest market teams:
- NBA: Warriors at $781 million vs. Grizzlies at $258 million, a 3x difference
- NFL: Revenue sharing equalizes distributions, reducing star-player dependency
- NBA: Players contribute 50% of their local revenue to a central pool for redistribution
- NFL: Broad national revenue sharing eliminates individual star-driven revenue variation
What a $76 Billion Deal Does to the NBA’s Future
The full impact of the new media rights deal will play out across the 11-year term ending in 2035-36. Cap smoothing limits annual increases to 10%, but that compounding means the 2035-36 salary cap will be more than double the current $154.6 million. Player salaries, tied directly to the cap percentage, double proportionally.
The deal also creates a structural argument for the next CBA negotiation in 2030. Players entering that negotiation will point to $76 billion in broadcast value and argue that 51% of a larger BRI pie still undervalues their contribution. Every new media deal in NBA history has been followed by CBA negotiations where players successfully expanded their share definition. The 2023 CBA added licensing revenue. The 2030 CBA will almost certainly add something else.
The NBA’s commercial growth has made its players among the most powerful labor group in American professional sports, not because they are more organized than the NFL’s union, but because the league’s economic structure depends on them in ways the NFL’s does not. Fifteen players drive the NBA’s viewership, sponsorship, and global commercial appeal. No individual NFL player drives anything close to equivalent revenue concentration.
The Bottom Line
The NBA is a player-driven league because its economics are built that way. Guaranteed contracts give stars leverage. The soft cap gives teams tools to retain them. The supermax gives franchises financial incentive to reward individual excellence. And a $76 billion media deal guarantees that the money players share will grow for at least a decade.
The NFL is an owner-driven league for the same structural reasons. Hard caps prevent overspending. Non-guaranteed contracts transfer risk to players. Equal revenue sharing among franchises reduces individual star dependency. And a CBA history in which owners have consistently won the key structural battles reflects a union that has prioritized minimum salaries and benefits over top-end player power.
What makes the NBA structurally different from the NFL:
- 51% vs. 48%: NBA players get a larger share of a growing revenue base
- Soft cap vs. hard cap: NBA teams can overspend to retain stars, NFL teams cannot
- Guaranteed contracts: NBA players hold leverage because teams cannot walk away from money already committed
- Supermax structure: Ties the largest contracts to individual merit, not just market size
- Star-driven revenue: NBA franchises depend on individual players to drive local commercial value, NFL franchises do not
- Media deal flow-through: Every broadcast dollar directly increases the cap, directly increasing player compensation
Neither model is objectively better for the sport. The NFL generates more total revenue. The NBA produces higher per-player salaries and more visible player agency. The difference is structural, deliberate, and the product of decades of negotiation in which each league’s players and owners settled on an economic arrangement that reflects how their sport actually works.
