Adidas Basketball: Its NBA and WNBA Deal, Athletes and Strategy

On adidas’s first-quarter call in April 2026, chief executive Bjørn Gulden picked out one category: “The only negative number here, is the basketball number.” Basketball sales fell 20% in the quarter, according to a summary of the results slides. Gulden said adidas needed to “reset the business,” called basketball “clearly in our priority,” said the company was working on a bigger presence in women’s basketball, and told analysts to watch the NBA draft (call transcript).

Two months later, three adidas athletes went in the first round: Darryn Peterson, second to the Utah Jazz, Mikel Brown Jr., sixth to the Brooklyn Nets, and Karim López, whom Memphis took at No. 21. Adidas had signed them as teenagers, Peterson in 2023 and López at 17. Max Staiger, adidas’s global general manager for basketball, said the brand was “striving to be the basketball brand for the next generation of players.” That strategy sits on a league deal adidas renewed in October 2025, and on a decision it made a decade earlier to give up the uniform.

What adidas’s NBA and WNBA deal covers

On 16 October 2025 the NBA announced a multiyear extension under which adidas continues as an official marketing partner of the NBA, WNBA and G League. Adidas also gets “a presence around Future Starts Now,” the league’s digital-first initiative telling the stories of rising players across social media and other platforms. No length, value or list of assets was disclosed. Staiger said the deal keeps adidas “at the center of global basketball culture” and lets it “invest equitably across the NBA and WNBA platforms.”

The NBA owns Future Starts Now. It launched in 2023 with a stream of Nike’s World Basketball Festival, and about half the video collections on its hub are Nike or Jordan Brand events, beside adidas’s 3SSB championships. The renewal gives adidas a place where the league introduces its next generation of players to fans, alongside its biggest rival.

Adidas gave up the uniform in 2015

Adidas signed an 11-year deal as the NBA’s apparel supplier in 2006, reported at $400 million. In 2015 it dropped its renewal bid after learning the league would open the rights to other bidders, saying it would “invest more in players on the court,” though CBS’s source said adidas had also fallen behind its competitors. Nike took over from the 2017-18 season as the first apparel partner with its logo on NBA uniforms, and its extension runs through 2037 as an outfitting, merchandising, marketing and content partnership.

Adidas stayed on as a marketing partner. Its 2021 renewal covered marketing rights in the footwear category, and the 2025 extension kept it as a marketing partner of all three leagues. Meanwhile the uniform became more valuable to everyone else: teams sell space on it too, NBA team sponsorship revenue passed $1.8 billion in 2025-26, and 29 of 30 teams carry a jersey-patch sponsor. Adidas competes for basketball attention without any of that on-court visibility.

What a brand buys without the uniform

A uniform deal sells visibility you don’t have to earn. Every game, highlight and photo carries the logo, whatever the brand does. A marketing partnership sells permission: the right to use league marks, to call yourself a partner, and to appear around league content. What that permission returns depends on what the brand puts inside it.

Adidas puts in three things it runs or backs. The first is its athletes and their signature shoes. The second is the grassroots pipeline: its 3SSB youth circuit, which the NBA streamed on the NBA App and YouTube in July 2026, and the ABCD Camp that Tracy McGrady and Sonny Vaccaro revived with adidas as sponsor. The NBA streamed 3SSB in 2025 too, before the renewal, so the coverage isn’t a result of the deal, but it shows how a partner’s own events can sit inside league channels. The third is the relationship with players before they turn pro. Cam Mason, adidas Basketball’s head of sports marketing, told Andscape: “we provide a curriculum.” Three first-round picks who signed as teenagers are what that pipeline looks like when it works.

The risk is that adidas pays for the association and its rival collects it. Nike is on every jersey and in a content partnership of its own, so when adidas’s basketball marketing looks generic, viewers can credit the league connection to the brand on the shirt. Every adidas appearance has to be unmistakably adidas, which is the problem our piece on brand codes versus category codes explains.

Who adidas has in the NBA and WNBA

In the NBA, Anthony Edwards of the Minnesota Timberwolves leads the roster, and his AE 3 launched in September 2026 at $130. Donovan Mitchell signed an extension for two more signature shoes and plays alongside James Harden, whom the Cavaliers acquired in February 2026. Damian Lillard is back with the Trail Blazers. In the WNBA, adidas signed Olivia Miles of the Minnesota Lynx, the 2026 Rookie of the Year, a signing welcomed by Candace Parker as president of adidas women’s basketball. Its WNBA athletes also include Aliyah Boston of the Indiana Fever and Satou Sabally of the New York Liberty, who released a player-exclusive shoe in July 2026. From 2027 adidas also becomes the uniform partner of Unrivaled, the women’s 3-on-3 league.

The lesson for brands that can’t buy the most visible asset

Most sponsors face a smaller version of adidas’s choice. A competitor already owns the shirt, the naming rights or the title sponsorship, and the question is whether a lesser partnership is worth it. It is when you have something of your own to put inside it: athletes, events, products or stories that only you can tell. Without that, a partner badge buys an association that viewers may credit to whoever owns the bigger asset.

A signature shoe gives an athlete’s fans something to buy. A famous face in a campaign gives them something to look at, and our look at whether an athlete ambassador lifts sign-ups shows how differently those two have to be measured. For adidas the numbers that matter are sales of athlete product, the players it signs before the draft, and the share of league storytelling it can fill with its own events. Your equivalent is the sales, sign-ups and reusable content the partnership produces, which our guide to measuring what a sports sponsorship returns covers.

Before signing a partnership that doesn’t include the most visible asset, decide what you will build inside it and who owns that work. The brand strategy decides how every appearance is recognizably yours, and a content plan turns each athlete and event into material you can use long after the game.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does adidas still sponsor the NBA?

Yes. In October 2025 the NBA announced a multiyear extension under which adidas continues as an official marketing partner of the NBA, WNBA and G League, with a presence around the league’s Future Starts Now digital initiative. Adidas doesn’t make the uniforms. It ended its apparel deal after the 2016-17 season, and Nike has been the uniform partner since, with an extension running through 2037.

Which NBA players are sponsored by adidas in 2026?

Adidas’s NBA roster includes Anthony Edwards of the Timberwolves, whose AE 3 launched in September 2026, Donovan Mitchell and James Harden of the Cavaliers, and Damian Lillard of the Trail Blazers. Mitchell extended his deal for two more signature shoes in 2026. Three adidas athletes went in the first round of the 2026 draft: Darryn Peterson to the Jazz, Mikel Brown Jr. to the Nets and Karim López to the Grizzlies.

Which WNBA players are with adidas?

Adidas’s WNBA athletes include Olivia Miles of the Minnesota Lynx, the 2026 Rookie of the Year, Aliyah Boston of the Indiana Fever, and Satou Sabally of the New York Liberty. Candace Parker leads the brand’s women’s basketball business as president. Adidas has said it is working on a bigger presence in women’s basketball, and it becomes the uniform partner of the Unrivaled 3-on-3 league from 2027.

Why did adidas stop making NBA uniforms?

Adidas held the NBA apparel deal from 2006, an 11-year agreement reported at $400 million. In 2015, after learning the league would open the rights to other bidders, adidas dropped its renewal bid and said it would invest more in players instead, though reports at the time said it had fallen behind rivals. Nike became the uniform supplier from the 2017-18 season. Adidas remained a league marketing partner.

What is adidas’s basketball strategy?

After basketball sales fell 20% in the first quarter of 2026, chief executive Bjørn Gulden said adidas needed to reset the business and made it a priority. The plan centers on young players signed early, three of whom went in the first round of the 2026 draft, a bigger presence in women’s basketball, signature shoes for stars such as Anthony Edwards and Donovan Mitchell, and grassroots events like the 3SSB circuit.