NBC Sports used nostalgia to reintroduce itself to NBA fans during its first year broadcasting NBA games. As it enters its second year, it’s embracing comic books to generate hype for the new season.
The NBCUniversal-owned outlet is turning the NBA’s biggest stars, including Jalen Brunson, Victor Wembanyama, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Jayson Tatum, Stephen Curry, and LeBron James, into comic book superheroes ahead of the 2026-2027 NBA season.
This limited campaign and activation celebrates the start of the regular season on NBC Sports and Peacock on Tuesday, Oct. 20, featuring the first-ever American Express NBA Tip-Off triple-header, with the Boston Celtics taking on the Detroit Pistons at 3 p.m. ET, the Philadelphia 76ers facing the defending NBA champion New York Knicks at 7 p.m. ET, and the Oklahoma City Thunder playing the San Antonio Spurs at 9:30 p.m. ET.
Authentic storytelling
“The start of the NBA season is one of the most exciting moments on the sports calendar, and this campaign gives us a unique way to celebrate it with fans of all 30 teams,” said Lyndsay Signor, senior vice president, sports marketing, Universal Television Entertainment Group.
Speaking to ADWEEK, Signor said NBC got to work immediately on marketing the new season after the 2025-26 NBA Finals. During the ideation period for this new campaign, the idea of NBA stars as superheroes kept coming up.
Depicting the athletes as comic book characters made it easy for Signor and the marketing team to use that as a springboard to highlight the network’s first-ever triple-header. They also used the campaign to spotlight individual teams across the league and highlight their broadcasting talent, including the ever-versatile Mike Tirico, who narrates the comic book, aptly titled Tip Off.
Veteran artists were used to illustrate the comic book characters for this campaign, including Ryan Benjamin, whose work includes Batman, X-Men, Iron Man, Captain America, Wonder Woman, and Star Wars across Marvel, DC, and WildStorm. Plus, Ryan Odagawa came aboard, whose credits span Marvel, WildStorm, Blizzard, and other entertainment brands. At Marvel, Odagawa worked on comic books such as Invincible Iron Man, where he illustrated the first appearances of F.R.I.D.A.Y. and Temugin.
“With each cover for each of the 30 teams, we wanted the storytelling to feel authentic to their stories, and their star players on each team,” said Signor, who added that creating unique covers for each team would resonate with their fan bases and non-NBA fans, acting like a funnel that draws them into the league and sport and gives them a sense of what makes each team special.
10-foot-tall comic-book installation
The comic book campaign makes its public debut at ComplexCon in Los Angeles on Oct. 3-4 with an immersive NBC Sports Tip-Off Comic Newsstand. Inspired by classic city newsstands, the experience will be the first opportunity for fans to receive complimentary copies of the comic promoting Tip-Off and the NBA season on NBC and Peacock, and participate in other on-site activations.
