The Indiana Pacers and Denver Nuggets play in Mexico City Saturday night, and while the league’s European matchups get much of the international buzz, Mexico has hosted the most NBA games outside of the U.S. and Canada.
This weekend’s matchup marks the 35th NBA game in Mexico—16 regular-season games and 19 preseason ones. It is the fifth straight year the NBA has hosted a regular-season game in Mexico and the 15th overall since 2014. But this year’s matchup has added buzz on the ground, coming three weeks after the city was floated as a potential expansion spot.
NBA owners were briefed last month at their board of governors meeting about at least one Mexico City-based group that approached investment bank PJT Partners, which is leading the NBA’s expansion process. It would include a new arena in the country’s capital, according to ESPN.
Commissioner Adam Silver appeared days later on the Pat McAfee Show and clarified that nothing was imminent in Mexico. “Maybe down the road there’s Mexico City, which is the largest city in North America,” Silver said. “It’s a shorter flight from New York to Mexico than from New York to Los Angeles, so you can see why we’d be interested.”
Las Vegas and Seattle remain at the front of the line for NBA expansion, but the opportunity in Mexico is clear. Mexico City has 22 million people in the metro area, and a team there would plant a flag in the country and serve as a gateway to the rest of Latin America.
There are more than 30 million NBA fans in Mexico, and basketball is the second most-played team sport, behind soccer, among Mexicans. The NBA is the leading U.S. sports league among Gen Z in Mexico, with 7.5 million fans, per GWI research.
The first NBA game in Mexico was in 1992, and the league opened an office there in 2009, headed by Raul Zarraga. The league currently has about 20 employees based there. The NBA has roughly two dozen global and regional marketing partners with a presence in Mexico, including Adidas, American Express, AT&T, AWS, Google, Microsoft, Nike and Wendy’s. Merchandise sales at the two brick-and-mortar NBA stores are up 78% year over year, while e-commerce sales rose 61%.
In 2021, the NBA G League added the Mexico City Capitanes as its first franchise outside of the U.S. and Canada. The team plays its games at Arena CDMX. The NBA 2K League also launched an esports team in Mexico in 2021.
The NBA had 125 international players on its opening day rosters. The lone Mexican player was Memphis Grizzlies forward Karim López.
This season’s Global Games move to Europe next, with January contests in Paris and Manchester, England. The Paris game is highly anticipated for the return of native son Victor Wembanyama, as the San Antonio Spurs play the New Orleans Pelicans at Accor Arena.