NBA Cut Out Middleman From Lucrative Emirates Deal, Lawsuit Says

A spokesperson for the NBA said the league does not comment on ongoing litigation. But in response to an April 2024 letter from Edalat’s attorney—which was attached as an exhibit to the lawsuit—an NBA lawyer wrote no compensation agreement with Edalat ever existed.

“Any interactions Edalat may have had with Emirates and a member of the NBA’s Basketball Operations group in 2014 have no relevance to the Emirates partnership that the NBA directly negotiated and announced a decade later,” the lawyer wrote. In a later motion, the NBA added Edalat’s complaint “contain virtually no details about the terms of this supposed agreement” and “confirms he provided no services whatsoever between 2015 and 2024 with respect to any deal between the NBA and Emirates.”

Edalat’s attorney, Tucker Byrd, didn’t respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for Emirates declined to comment.

‘A Visionary Industry Disruptor’

The NBA in recent years has made a point of expanding its footprint in the Middle East. It began playing preseason games in Abu Dhabi in 2022 and, later that year, changed its rules to allow sovereign wealth funds to invest in teams. Emirates’s logo is increasingly ubiquitous in the NBA, appearing on referee jerseys and the custom courts used for NBA Cup games. But back in 2014, Edalat’s lawsuit alleges, the league lacked the relationships it needed to reach Emirates’s top decision-makers.

That, Edalat says, is why VanDeWeghe came to him. The complaint describes Edalat as having “deep ties” to the region, including relationships with business and government leaders, though it offers little detail about how those relationships were built. On LinkedIn, he describes himself as “a visionary industry disruptor driven by his desire to transform the pharmaceuticals industry to better serve patients and consumers.”

Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

The nature of Edalat’s relationship with VanDeWeghe is also unclear. In one email attached as an exhibit, Edalat refers to VanDeWeghe as “one of my dearest friends,” but the filing provides little other detail about the origins of their relationship.

VanDeWeghe did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The NBA has disputed the idea it needed Edalat to make key connections with Emirates. In its response to Edalat’s attorney, the league wrote the airline had sponsored NBA games in China in 2012 and 2013. The NBA also pointed to a 2013 report about discussions between the league and Emirates about a possible partnership.

Still, according to the complaint, after receiving VanDeWeghe’s email, Edalat began working on the NBA’s behalf, he says. He engaged Zaki Kada, a longtime friend and business contact in Dubai, who then reached out to Salem Ghanem Al-Marri, a former colleague who worked as Emirates’s head of planning, aeropolitical, and industry affairs. Kada, according to the complaint, used that connection to inquire about approaching Boutros Boutros, an SVP at the airline.

Emirates, according to the complaint, requested something official from the NBA confirming its interest. On May 1, 2014, VanDeWeghe sent a letter on league letterhead to Clark, Emirates’s president, saying the NBA was “excited about the possibility of a potential partnership” and that its “focus is for Emirates to become the exclusive airline sponsor and partner of the NBA.”

The letter also referenced Edalat’s role.

“Liwa North America and CEO Paul Edalat has provided this introduction and will continue to assist in seeing the process through,” VanDeWeghe wrote, according to the complaint.

Armed with that letter, Edalat traveled to Dubai and met with Boutros during the week of May 11, 2014, according to the complaint. The suit alleges Boutros responded favorably and said he would discuss the opportunity with other senior Emirates executives.

The effort did not immediately result in a deal. According to the complaint, the NBA’s discussions with Emirates cooled later that year as the league focused on renegotiating with Delta. But in early 2015, Edalat’s suit alleges, VanDeWeghe asked him to reengage with Emirates.

That July, Edalat emailed VanDeWeghe saying Emirates had “come back to the table.” VanDeWeghe responded by introducing Edalat over email to Mark Tatum, the NBA’s deputy commissioner. Tatum then responded directly to Edalat, according to the complaint.

“We are still very interested in having a discussion with Emirates about a partnership,” Tatum wrote. “Let’s set up a call or meeting to discuss.”

Tatum was ultimately unable to meet with Edalat in Las Vegas that month, but he dispatched two senior NBA business executives—Emilio Collins, then the head of the league’s global marketing partnerships department, and Rachel Jacobson, who ran global business development—to meet with him instead. (Neither works for the league now.) In an email included in the complaint, Tatum wrote Collins and Jacobson had “actually been in discussions with Emirates” and were “equipped” to talk with Edalat about a potential partnership going forward.

Edalat met with Collins and Jacobson at the Wynn Las Vegas on July 16, 2015, according to the complaint. But the talks between the NBA and Emirates soon stalled again. By the end of that summer, the lawsuit alleges, Jacobson told Edalat over the phone that the NBA would continue with Delta because the league could not find common ground with Emirates.

Nearly a decade later, the Emirates deal resurfaced.

In February 2024, the NBA announced its multiyear partnership with Emirates. Edalat contends that despite his role, he was neither included in the final negotiations nor compensated.

The NBA has denied liability, and the case remains ongoing. It has since been transferred to federal court in the Southern District of New York. No trial date has been set, but the sides show no signs of settling. Byrd said last year he hopes the case goes to trial. The NBA, meanwhile, argued in a recent motion that the case should be dismissed, writing that Edalat has since provided “only vague allegations of an oral agreement.”

The post NBA Cut Out Middleman From Lucrative Emirates Deal, Lawsuit Says appeared first on Front Office Sports.