'They are dream investors': Inside the billion-dollar Middle East race to control the future of basketball

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  • Brian WindhorstOct 16, 2025, 07:00 AM ET

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    • ESPN.com NBA writer since 2010
    • Covered Cleveland Cavs for seven years
    • Author of two books

ABU DHABI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES -- It's a few minutes before tipoff in the first NBA game of any sort in the 2025-26 season and the basketball court inside Etihad Arena is overflowing with training camp-sized rosters of Knicks and 76ers players and officials.

On the sideline, Patrick Ewing is shaking hands with a man from Beirut who is wearing a vintage No. 33 Knicks jersey. Derrick Rose, who was flown in for the event, is posing for photos with a group of Filipino fans.

Steve Harvey and Patrick Schwarzenegger, among other invited celebrities, are being escorted to courtside seats.

Throughout the crowd, many Emirati men are wearing kanduras, traditional ankle-length white robes, but they are vastly outnumbered by ex-pats from dozens of other countries, including a teenager from Riyadh a few rows behind the 76ers bench, wearing an Anthony Edwards Team USA jersey and a pair of the newest version of Edwards' Adidas signature shoes, which technically hadn't even been released yet.

But perhaps the most interesting interaction taking place is between two Americans.

Next to the team benches are two of the most powerful men in the NBA, Knicks owner James Dolan and commissioner Adam Silver, laughing and chatting, warmly embracing the evening together despite years of frosty relations.

Standing between Dolan and Silver is the man who brought them together: His Excellency Mohamed Khalifa Al Mubarak, who has spent the past decade developing relationships and directing growing investment dollars to bring top stakeholders in the sport to Abu Dhabi.

That Silver and Dolan are aligned on their partnerships with Al Mubarak is one of the signs that the future of global basketball is being brokered now amid the giant cranes and rising cities in the Middle East.

Despite their differences at home, Dolan and Silver are united in knowing this is a vitally important relationship to nurture.

International basketball is on the cusp of a new, richer and expansive era that is aiming to deliver more of the sport to underserved fans and -- perhaps more importantly -- capture vast sovereign wealth fund capital that is seeking a place to invest in the sport.

Some legacy leagues are in danger of being left behind. Some new leagues are trying to rise up. The NBA is focused on defending and strengthening its position as the biggest dog.

And, despite the scrutiny it might create, that means deepening relations with Abu Dhabi and its wealthy neighbors.


"WHEN I CLOSE my eyes, I can see an NBA game being played in front of 22,500 people at the Sphere," Al Mubarak says as he leans back in a chair in a glittering building on the expansive NYU Abu Dhabi campus.

He's not talking about Las Vegas.

"We will have the world's greatest technology where we can immerse the fans in the experience and they can feel the game on a new level."

Al Mubarak, or "the chairman" as he is often referred to by colleagues in his various cultural and leadership positions in Abu Dhabi, has engineered partnerships with the likes of Pope Francis, renowned architect Frank Gehry and UFC CEO Dana White. But he loves American sports and is an active NBA fan.

"I have some mixed feelings on the [Luka] Doncic trade," Al Mubarak says, referencing his favorite team, the Lakers. "I am a believer in the importance of the traditional big man and Anthony Davis was such a part of the [2020] championship. But I know that Luka is motivated and he is one of the most talented players in the game."

Over the summer, the Department of Culture and Tourism (DCT) Abu Dhabi, of which Al Mubarak is the chairman, finalized a massive deal with Dolan's Sphere Entertainment to construct and operate a new venue in the UAE, with rights to build more in the Middle East and North Africa over the next 10 years.

The original Sphere, which opened in Las Vegas in 2023, cost Dolan's company $2.3 billion to construct and has since lost more than $1 billion, according to its public financial disclosures. Dolan declined to comment for this story.

Dolan turned to Abu Dhabi, where he found willing partners, both in the Sphere and in the Knicks, after a six-year effort to build a second Sphere in London failed in 2024 amid a tangle of red tape and political pushback.

Last season Abu Dhabi's tourism arm, Experience Abu Dhabi, became the Knicks jersey-patch sponsor in a multiyear lucrative deal, but that was an appetizer to the Sphere partnership that came later.

More NBA-linked deals are in the works in Abu Dhabi.

This fall, the NBA is expected to finalize a long-term extension of its relationship with the DCT that will guarantee annual preseason games in Abu Dhabi and establish a new NBA Global Academy at NYU's Abu Dhabi campus, where top prospects from around the world will be sent to live, get an education and develop their games. The deal is expected to last well into the next decade, sources told ESPN.

It is also a precursor to another large and potentially pivotal deal.

The NBA is in discussions with Al Mubarak and other leaders about investing in NBA Europe, which has emerged as a league priority over the past year.

In what could prove to be a signature move of Silver's tenure, the NBA is investigating launching a new NBA-branded European league as early as 2027, with a mix of existing teams recruited away from other leagues and expansion.

Abu Dhabi is considering the possible launch of a team in Manchester, where they have owned and turned Manchester City Football Club into a global leader in soccer with world-class infrastructure.

"It is a possibility," Al Mubarak said of investing in an expansion team in NBA Europe. "The NBA is the world's best basketball league and we have a deep commitment and track record of success in the [Manchester] community."

The NBA is seeding the ground ahead of the potential investment in Manchester. Last summer, the league conducted its first-ever Basketball Without Borders event in the United Kingdom by bringing top teen boys and girls to Manchester. In the 2026-27 season, the league is exploring bringing NBA teams to play at least one game in Manchester, sources told ESPN.

Silver and deputy commissioner Mark Tatum traveled to London and Paris over the summer for meetings about placing teams in both cities. They also met with leadership from Real Madrid about recruiting the legacy team to the NBA Europe league.

In August, NBA Hall of Famer Tony Parker, who owns ASVEL, a team based near Lyon, France, indicated his interest in jumping to the new league by telling reporters: "NBA Europe league for me is just a matter of time. They are coming, and it's going to happen."

In recent weeks, leadership in legacy European teams Alba Berlin in Germany and Galatasaray, a large multisport conglomerate in Istanbul, have confirmed publicly their interest in NBA Europe.

But having Abu Dhabi invest, be it in Manchester or elsewhere, is a huge boost for the concept. And with a potential expansion fee in the hundreds of millions to join the league, it could set an important standard for other investors as the new league establishes its footing.

"They are the lead investors in Manchester City. And they've had tremendous success there. They've demonstrated they are innovators in sport. They've demonstrated that they're in it for the long term, that they're not just financial investors, that they're active participants," Silver said as he stood with Tatum and George Aivazoglou, the NBA's head of Europe and the Middle East, all of whom came to Abu Dhabi to continue discussions about the future.

"So they are dream investors."

Such foreign investment -- across many industries -- has sometimes drawn criticism. The NBA is far from alone among high-profile American companies with ties to Abu Dhabi, including Microsoft, Lockheed Martin, Warner Bros., the Cleveland Clinic and ESPN parent company Disney, which earlier this year announced a partnership with Abu Dhabi for a theme park not far from where the new Sphere will be constructed. The NBA, for its part, has previously faced concern about partnerships with countries and leaders whose values don't necessarily align with those publicly supported by the league itself.

In launching its Basketball Africa League in 2021, the NBA came under congressional scrutiny for partnering with Rwandan dictator Paul Kagame. Earlier this year, the government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo called for the NBA and other international sports leagues and teams to sever ties with Rwanda and questioned whether the NBA's "commitment to social justice and respect for human rights" aligns with its business ties to Rwanda.

Last year, as the NBA's ties with Abu Dhabi deepened, Human Rights Watch issued a warning, saying, in part: "The NBA should be aware that the U.A.E. hosts high profile sporting, entertainment, and cultural events to promote a public image of openness and tolerance at odds with the government's rampant systemic human rights violations." These include what HRW calls unequal rights for women.

The NBA has responded to these claims in the past by saying the league follows "the lead of the U.S. government as to where it's appropriate to engage in business around the world," as deputy commissioner Tatum said in a letter to U.S. senators last year. Through the building of courts and investments in new programs, the NBA has fostered growth in basketball in Rwanda, including for many women.

The NBA also has championed the Middle East partnerships' effect on basketball participation in the region, citing studies that show a 400% increase in participation in the UAE and 50% in the Middle East over the past five years among boys and girls. Formula 1, the European Tour and WTA Tour also have long-standing relationships with and hold major events in Abu Dhabi.

"I think that what we share with the leaders [in Abu Dhabi] is this belief in the power of sport, and that as we look around the world, very few things that create commonality, empathy, understanding in the way sport does," Silver told ESPN.

"For example, I think many people outside the region might be surprised to see that there are an equal number of girls and boys in the youth programs here. And that there are universal values that are being taught in terms of respect, discipline, hard work, teamwork, understanding -- all fundamental values that we share. And at a time when so much divides us, it's nice to be focused on things that bring us together."

TWO NIGHTS BEFORE the NBA opened its season in Abu Dhabi, a seminal event took place 75 miles down the E11 highway, in the sprawling metropolis of Dubai.

There, two-year-old Dubai Basketball hosted its first-ever EuroLeague game against Serbian basketball power KK Partizan at the modern Coca-Cola Arena.

The EuroLeague, the most competitive league in the world outside the NBA, is facing an uncertain future with NBA Europe looming and threatening its markets.

In response, the EuroLeague took the extraordinary step of giving the brand-new Dubai team a five-year wild-card berth into the league. The deal, according to reports in Europe, includes covering the traveling expenses of European teams that will fly up to seven hours for the away games.

Bringing major Western sporting events to the UAE is a goal of all this investment.

After 15 years as title sponsor of the EuroLeague, Turkish Airlines was replaced this season by Abu Dhabi-owned Etihad Airlines on a four-year deal that will assist in the travel. Emirates Airline, the Dubai-owed rival of Etihad, signed a long-term deal with the NBA in 2024 to become the title sponsor of the NBA Cup.

Still, the league doesn't currently have plans to base an NBA Europe team in the Middle East and playing the NBA Cup final in Dubai isn't under consideration, Silver told ESPN.

Recently, the league announced changes to the NBA Cup schedule, including moving the semifinals to home team markets from Las Vegas starting in 2026, with the final at a neutral site.

Last spring, the EuroLeague held its final four in Abu Dhabi, another deal put together by Al Mubarak, to sold out crowds, the first time the event had ever been held outside Europe.

The future of European basketball, it is increasingly clear, runs through the UAE.

LAST APRIL, IN a news release that made some noise in the private equity world, TWG Global announced a $10 billion investment from Mubadala Capital with the proceeds "to be used by TWG to capitalize on its attractive set of proprietary investment opportunities."

TWG Global is the holding company for the investments of Los Angeles businessman Mark Walter and his partners. Mubadala Capital is the asset management wing of Abu Dhabi's largest sovereign wealth fund.

Two months later, this development contributed to enormous noise in the sports world when Walter, via TWG Global, agreed to buy the controlling share of the Los Angeles Lakers for a $10 billion valuation.

The future of the NBA's most prized franchise, it seems, is also linked to the UAE.

The Middle East interest in new basketball ventures goes deeper.

Two years ago, the Qatar Investment Fund, the sovereign wealth fund of the wealthy Gulf nation, bought 5% of the Washington Wizards' parent company. That same year, Qatar won a bid to host the 2027 FIBA World Cup.

The fund is also the controlling owner of European soccer power Paris Saint-Germain, which in March 2025 confirmed it had been in talks regarding NBA Europe.

Like Abu Dhabi with its Manchester City property, PSG could launch an expansion team under the same brand and act as an anchor tenant. Over the summer, in a move that could ultimately dovetail with such an eventual basketball investment, PSG made a landmark agreement to expand a partnership with NBA superstar Kevin Durant in which Durant got a small ownership stake in PSG.

"This club has big plans ahead and I can't wait to be a part of the next phase of growth," Durant said at the time. "And to explore new investment opportunities with [Qatar]."

There are other ventures also seeking investment from Middle East sources.

In February, the Financial Times reported the sovereign wealth funds of both Singapore and Saudi Arabia were among the potential backers behind a new global circuit basketball league.

In the months since, the extent of the Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund's (PIF) proposed involvement in the new basketball league has not been formally made public. Sela, a Saudi events company owned by the PIF, did confirm its involvement with the startup league.

Multiple player agents, current and former league executives and support staffers told ESPN they'd been recruited to join the league ahead of a possible 2026 launch and, in some cases, were required to sign NDAs.

At times, this recruitment involved superstar LeBron James' longtime business partner Maverick Carter, who worked as an adviser to the league for months.

Last week, Carter confirmed to ESPN he had left the venture, which calls itself Project B and its representatives said in media interviews it is now focusing on starting a women's basketball league to rival the WNBA.

The PIF and Sela did not respond to requests for comment on their level of involvement. A spokesperson for Swiss banking giant UBS, which announced it was advising the startup league earlier this year, declined to comment on its current relationship with the project but confirmed the fledgling league was still a client.

James' representatives, including agent Rich Paul, told ESPN that James himself was not connected to the venture.

James has developed a relationship with Saudi Arabian leaders and the PIF over the past few years, though. James held a clinic at Al-Azem Academy in Riyadh in 2023 as a guest of Saudi Minister of Culture Bader bin Farhan Al Saud. Last January, James became a team owner in E1, a global electric boat racing circuit that was launched by the PIF. Tom Brady and Rafael Nadal are also affiliated with teams in E1.

At a recent conference hosted by Front Office Sports, Silver said he was not following those developments, but added: "Competition is good. It keeps everyone on their toes."

Silver, however, is focused on his Middle East partners in Abu Dhabi. How and where all the money might flow and the impact it could have remains to be seen.

But what is known is that the connection between the NBA and the Middle East is real, and an expansion of the relationship is coming, and the league is shoring up support with rivals, both seen and unseen, across the region.

"We are thinking about the long term, not just the next couple of years," Al Mubarak said. "I believe that this partnership with the NBA will outlive me."

ESPN's Ramona Shelburne contributed to this story.

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