Knicks’ New Look Signals Growing Business Ties of Dolans, NBA With Middle East

The New York Knicks kick off the 2024-25 season tonight not just with expectations of a title run, but also a new look that reflects the global business ambitions of owner James Dolan.

The new Knicks official patch sponsor this season is “Experience Abu Dhabi,” the tourism promotional campaign of Abu Dhabi’s Department of Culture and Tourism.

This oil-rich Persian Gulf emirate’s tagline will feature on the upper-left corner of each player’s jersey.

But it’s more than just a patch: it represents Abu Dhabi’s aspirations to become a regional entertainment and tourism powerhouse and the eagerness of the NBA and the Dolan family to capitalize on this lucrative opportunity.

Abu Dhabi Wants to Be the Next Dubai

Abu Dhabi is one of the seven emirates that make up the United Arab Emirates. Many Americans know the area as where the cartoon character Garfield has long wanted to banish his nemesis Nermal. But it’s the largest oil-producing emirate within the UAE, which itself ranks among the top global producers.

For more than a decade, Abu Dhabi has tried to pivot away from oil and replicate the non-oil economic success of its flashier sister emirate Dubai, building a competing container port, a local tourism industry, and a global airline carrier, Etihad Airways.

Etihad has sponsored the Premier League’s Manchester City since 2009 and, since 2015, the Washington Wizards and other Monumental Sports & Entertainment franchises.

Dubai, however, has not only had the initiative but has also captured more prestigious brands. The Dubai government-owned airline Emirates has sponsored the Premier League’s Arsenal since 2006 and the U.S. Open since 2012. It was also named sponsor of the NBA’s in-season tournament, the NBA Cup, this year.

(Qatar Airways, the state-owned airline of another wealthy regional state has been a sponsor of the Brooklyn Nets and the Barclays Center since 2018. Qatar, which hosted the 2022 FIFA World Cup, also owns a five percent stake in Monumental.)

With Experience Abu Dhabi, the emirate wants to draw in more American tourists to visit attractions like the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, which replicates in many ways the style and grandeur of the Taj Mahal, the Louvre Abu Dhabi, as well as sports venues and theme parks, like Ferrari World and Warner Bros. World.

Enter the Dolans and the NBA

Experience Abu Dhabi replaces the Knicks’ previous sponsor: Sphere, the Dolan-controlled company behind the spectacular Las Vegas entertainment venue.

The Sphere Entertainment Co. just announced that it would establish its second venue worldwide in Abu Dhabi. Together, these reflect the deepening business relationship between the Dolans and Abu Dhabi.

For the Dolans, Abu Dhabi is a friend in need. Sphere is burning cash faster than it is burning retinas, posting a staggering $341.2 million loss in the 2024 fiscal year.

Beyond the Knicks, the NBA itself has an expanding relationship with the emirate, which has hosted preseason games since 2022. Abu Dhabi is the new pivot of the NBA’s global expansion. ESPN’s Brian Windhorst writes that “the growth in the Arabian Peninsula has largely replaced China as the NBA’s front-facing international focus.”

From Oil to Entertainment

The broader Arabian Peninsula, the landmass in southwest Asia home to Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and other countries, is in the midst of an entertainment boom, driven by surpluses from oil sales and the competing master plans of the region’s monarchs.

The Dolans and the NBA are going all-in not just in pursuit of this cash, but also a tremendous upside as local barriers to gambling erode.

Gambling is prohibited in Islam and in most Muslim-majority countries. However, the UAE is developing a regulatory framework that would legalize gambling on its territory.

Casino operators Caesars Entertainment and Wynn Resorts are already positioned to exploit legalized gambling in the UAE to try to get a foothold.

For the Dolans and even Adam Silver’s NBA, the Middle East also represents a potential new sports betting market.

But No Democracy

Entertainment possibilities are booming in the Gulf, but it’s not all fun in games in this part of the world. Politics, still, is no laughing matter. Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE remain deeply authoritarian states. Speaking out against its unelected rulers will result in severe punishment.

The NBA’s push into Abu Dhabi has rekindled, to some degree, criticism that it is facilitating attempts by authoritarian countries to launder their reputations using sports — what many call “sportswashing.” Others also point to the discrepancy between the NBA’s embrace of social justice politics at home and its expanding presence in countries where political protest results in imprisonment.

In 2019, at the height of the Black Lives Matter movement, then-Houston Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey tweeted in support of pro-democracy protestors in Hong Kong as China’s Communist Party sought to deepen its control over the territory. Beijing, in retaliation, took the NBA off the air for over a year.

Though the NBA ended its relationship with a basketball academy in Xinjiang, the Chinese region where over a million Uyghur Muslims have been sent to internment camps, it shied away from direct comments on human rights in China.

The NBA’s expanding presence in the Middle East has triggered a relatively more muted outcry as the region’s sovereign wealth funds have become investors of choice of media and technology companies worldwide.

So, at least for the foreseeable future, pivoting to the Middle East is a gamble both the Dolans and the NBA can afford to make.

Arif Rafiq is the editor of Globely News. Rafiq has contributed commentary and analysis on global issues for publications such as Foreign Affairs, Foreign Policy, the New Republic, the New York Times, and POLITICO Magazine.

He has appeared on numerous broadcast outlets, including Al Jazeera English, the BBC World Service, CNN International, and National Public Radio.