NBC, Amazon Make Crucial Scorebug Errors in NBA Postseason

The NBA’s new broadcast partners have each made significant errors on their scorebugs this postseason.

With 5.6 seconds remaining in Game 2 of the first-round series between the Knicks and Hawks on Monday, NBC’s scorebug showed New York had a timeout remaining. New York trailed Atlanta, 107–106. 

Before Hawks guard CJ McCollum took his second of two free throws, NBC play-by-play announcer Noah Eagle said it was “almost guaranteed” that New York would follow by calling timeout. But the Knicks didn’t call a timeout. 

Instead, they rushed down court, and Mikal Bridges rose up for a midrange jumper near the left baseline for a potential game-winner that clanked off the rim. The fallout of the loss led to questions about the Knicks not using the timeout, including from NBC studio analyst and former Knick Carmelo Anthony.

But it turned out that New York didn’t actually have a timeout. NBC admitted the error during halftime of its second playoff broadcast of the night between the Nuggets and Timberwolves.

“We just want to say that the scoreboard showed a timeout that the Knicks did not have on the final play, but due to a data issue, the wrong timeout information was communicated, so that’s why you see a timeout on the scorebug,” NBC host Maria Taylor said during halftime of Game 2 between Denver and Minnesota.

A timeout had been erroneously added on the NBC scorebug before McCollum’s second free-throw attempt.

The blunder came just days after Amazon Prime Video made a similar error during a play-in tournament game between the Heat and Hornets.

With 4.7 seconds left in overtime and the Hornets ahead 127–126, the Prime Video scorebug showed the Heat had a timeout remaining Unlike the NBC broadcast, Prime Video game analyst Stan Van Gundy contradicted the scorebug, saying: “There’s no timeouts left for Miami.”

After the Heat’s Davion Mitchell missed a game-winner at the buzzer, the timeout was removed from the scorebug.

Moments before the scorebug mistake, the Prime Video feed was cut for nearly two minutes during the final minute of overtime. Amazon later released a statement citing a “hardware failure in our production truck.”

NBC and Amazon are the NBA’s two new broadcast partners as part of an 11-year, $77 billion media deal that started this season.