Atlanta Hawks Announced Streaming Partnership With Amazon Is A Huge Win For Fans

When FanDuel Sports Network announced it was closing its doors, it left many Atlanta Hawks fans wondering how they were going to be able to watch their favorite team. Over the summer, the organization announced that it would broadcast games on Atlanta News First stations and Peachtree TV. Even better than that, longtime voices of the Hawks, Bob Rathbun and Hawks legend Dominique Wilkins, were going to be back on the broadcast team for every game this season, aside from those only on national TV.

The news got even better today. One day before the Hawks' regular-season opener against the Orlando Magic, the Hawks they are going to be the first team to stream games exclusively on Amazon.

Why this is a big deal

I think this is going to be something that more NBA teams will try to do, but kudos to the Hawks for getting out ahead of this and making this season's games more accessible and easy to watch. The end of last season brought out a lot of uncertainity about where the Hawks were going to broadcast their games and who was going to be doing that, but it is hard to imagine the Hawks could have done a better job than this, especially ahead of such a pivotal season for the franchise.

“We are so excited to have an incredible relationship with Prime Video, who has proven to be an innovative and accessible pillar for both the NBA and NFL. Our fans are at the heart of all of our decisions so being able to deliver Hawks games to our fans however and wherever they choose to watch - whether that be in front of a Connected TV, on a tablet or on a cellphone – is critically important with consumer’s ever-changing viewing habits,” said Andrew Saltzman, president of business enterprise and chief commercial officer of the Atlanta Hawks and State Farm Arena. “We are committed to putting our fans first and maximizing accessibility throughout the state of Georgia and the Southeast.”

Some important info from today's release:

• All local games (non-national exclusive broadcasts) are available to stream for in-market fans with a Prime membership, with no additional subscription required.
• The Hawks television territory covers Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, Mississippi, and South Carolina
• You can stream games through the web and the Amazon Prime app

Being more accessible is a huge win for fans of the team, and given the talent on this roster, this is a highly anticipated season. Atlanta returns the starting five of Jalen Johnson, CJ McCollum, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Dyson Daniels, and Onyeka Okongwu, while adding Kingston Flemings, Lu Dort, and Aaron Wiggins. They are expected to compete for a playoff spot in a very tough Eastern Conference, and now fans are going to have multiple ways to see every game that the team plays.