With the return of Bob Costas as host of Sunday Night Baseball, NBC is leaning fully into one of the most interesting sports media strategies in years. Call it NEW-stalgia.
Once NBC won back the NBA and MLB, it embraced the warm, fuzzy feeling many fans had for their previous coverage of both leagues. Think of the strategy as a nostalgic paean to NBC’s coverage from the 1990s—while moving both sports forward via new personalities, innovations, and technology.
NBC’s coverage of the NBA from 1990-2002 is recalled by many as a golden era, with Michael Jordan’s dynastic Bulls winning all six of their titles on the network’s air.
NBC’s media history with baseball is even more intriguing. The network has broadcast more World Series than any other network: 39. NBC aired the first televised World Series in 1949; the first All-Star Game in 1952; and was the home of familiar programming like the Game of the Week and Monday Night Baseball from 1957-2000.
But what about millennials who weren’t around for sports coverage in the ‘90s? NBC still wants them. The average sports TV viewer is in their mid-50’s. So NBC’s not making the mistake of ignoring current fans in a quixotic pursuit of youth. Instead, it’s like a classic rock band playing the oldies for these graying viewers. That’s why fans are seeing familiar faces, theme songs, and graphics. Here are some more details on NBC’s back to the future approach:
- NBC has earned critical praise for its first NBA game coverage in over 20 years. The network brought back John Tesh’s classic “Roundball Rock” theme to open its game telecast and paid through the nose for MJ himself to serve as a “special contributor” via taped interviews with Mike Tirico. Even if His Airness’s interviews haven’t added much, NBC’s early NBA numbers speak for themselves. The network opened the 2025-2026 season with the most-watched NBA Tipoff doubleheader in 15 years. Its two Martin Luther King Day afternoon tilts—Knicks vs. Mavericks and Thunder vs. Cavaliers—were the most watched since 1992. Season-to-date, NBC’s Tuesday night game coverage is drawing an average 2.7 million viewers, up 82% from last year, when the games aired on TNT, and on pace for the best season since 2013-2014.
- There’s no non-player more synonymous with the Grand Old Game than Costas, according to NBC executive producer Sam Flood. The 29-time Emmy winner will launch his comeback on MLB’s Opening Day, March 26, hosting the pregame before NBC’s telecast of the World Series champion Dodgers taking on the Diamondbacks in an exclusive primetime window. Costas’s return to NBC, where he spent 40 years, will put a fitting coda on his career. “As I’ve always said, I don’t need a brass band and a parade, but if we can do some good work, have some fun and it feels like the right, concluding chapter, I think everybody will be gratified by that,” he said on a press call.
- Similar to its return to the NBA, older MLB viewers should feel an instant familiarity with NBC’s baseball coverage. “There will certainly be an acknowledgment of nostalgia and what we represent as a company in baseball. We’ll be part of the narrative,” Flood said on the press call. “But we’re also going to move the sport forward like we have with the NBA. We’re going to try some new things that we’ve done in the NBA…. We’ve got some neat ideas that will take people deeper into the game, we hope, and build out the sport that we love because we have a bunch of baseball hard-core fans in our building that couldn’t have celebrated any louder when this deal came to fruition.”
Tying it together is Costas—the face of NBC’s baseball and basketball coverage in the ‘90s. Earlier this NBA season, he reprised his former on-air hoops role, delivering multiple opening teases for the NBA on NBC. He’ll continue to contribute to the network’s coverage as the season continues.
This year, NBC’s Sunday Night Football reigned as the No. 1 show on prime time TV for a record 15th straight year. By regaining first the NBA, then MLB, NBC is basically taking over the most-watched night of the week, noted Costas.
“The media landscape has changed, it’s true. But the next two deals here allow Sunday night to become sports night year-round on NBC—Sunday Night Football, Sunday Night NBA, Sunday Night Baseball,” Costas said.
