Commercial inventory for TNT Sports’ coverage of the NBA’s All-Star Weekend is virtually sold out, adding momentum after Sunday’s record-setting Super Bowl.

Advertisers who spent big to create Super Bowl campaigns are using All-Star Weekend as a high-profile opportunity to extend those efforts, Jon Diament, executive VP, ad sales at TNT Sports parent Warner Bros. Discovery, told Broadcasting+Cable.

“On the heels of a record-breaking Super Bowl, we think that this should be a record-breaking All-Star weekend,” Diament said.

Despite a 27% drop in viewership for last season to 4.59 million, NBA sales were up during the upfront and the scatter market for sports has been healthy, he said. “That all adds up to being sold out completely for Saturday and virtually sold out for Sunday.”

Prices for ads are up, but the increases didn’t reach the double digit range.

Advertisers in the soda, beer, auto, insurance and entertainment categories are the top spenders in the year’s All Stars, and betting continues as a healthy category.

“Live sports continue to be highly sought after by sponsor and we’re sold out. These advertisers don’t want to run a commercial. They want to activate throughout the whole weekend, whether it’s through events, or social media or creative opportunities like on-court signage or being affiliated with athletes to take advantage of these cultural moments.’

Over the weekend, TNT Sports will air All-Star events on TNT, alternate telecasts on truTV, and digital and streaming content on Bleacher Report and B/R Sports on Max.

On Friday trading card company Panini sponsors the Rising Stars game. A post game show will be presented by Kia.

State Farm presents All-Star Saturday Night, with AT&T sponsoring the Slam Dunk Challenge, Kia presenting the All Star Skills Challenge and Starry owning the 3-point challenge.

AT&T will also be sponsoring the Shaq cam, which will capture the reactions of Inside the NBA’s Shaquille O’Neal during the dunk contest.

The dunk content will also have a live stream on the B/R app and YouTube page. A camera will follow O’Neal as he moves around the court in between dunks.

State Farm will sponsor a live taping in Indianapolis of Taylor Rooks X with guest Tyrese Haliburton of the Pacers.

State Farm also sponsors a Roadshow Obstacle course that uses the insurance company’s jingle as the timer for events that include dribbling, passing and shooting.

Retailer JD Sports is sponsoring posts on B/R Kicks and House of Highlights showing player fashion as they arrive for All Star Weekend.

American Express will sponsor The All-Star Game Show Presented By American Express, a Family Feud-style trivia program that will see if NBA players know what fans think.

On Saturday, WBD’s truTV will air an alternate telecast sponsored by NIke’s Jordan Brand that will feature Jason Tatum and Carmelo Anthony.

During the All-Star Game itself on Sunday, truTV and B/R on Max will have another alternate telecast presented by Jordan Brand. It will be hosted by Taylor Rooks with Draymond Green and Charles Barkley. Jamal Crawford will also contribute as a sideline reporter.

The main telecast of the game is presented by Kia. The game will be preceded by a two-hour NBA All-Star Tip-Off presented by CarMax on TNT, TBS, truTV and B/R Sports on Max, featuring the Inside the NBA studio team of Ernie Johnson, Barkley, O’Neal, and Kenny Smith.

The slump in the advertising market didn’t stop Warner Bros. Discovery from selling out its inventory across the NBA’s All-Star Weekend.

“We’re sold out,” Jon Diament, executive VP for ad sales at WBD, said. “This is the best year we’ve ever had.”

Diament said that in addition to official league sponsors–big names long associated with the NBA like Kia, State Farm and AT&T, this year’s All-Star weekend has 20 new advertisers in the lineup.

Those advertisers are in categories including beer, tech, auto, movies, telcos and snack.

“All those big blue-chip type advertisers for sports are back in a pretty big way,” Diament said.

Last year, the NBA’s All-Star Weekend generated $27.3 million in ad revenue, according to Kantar. The All-Star Game itself garnered $9.3 million, with 30-second spots going for $65,847. The pregame All-Star Tip-Off Show brought in another $5.4 million.

One advertiser stepping up big time this year is Nike’s Jordan Brand. That’s Jordan as in Michael Jordan, who played in a couple of All-Star games during his career as the GOAT of the NBA.

Jordan Brand will be the presenting sponsor of the pre-All Star Game draft during which team captains LeBron James and Giannis Antetokounmpo select their squads. The first 30 minutes of the TNT telecast will also be streamed live on the Bleacher Report app.

Jordan Brand is also sponsoring the Rising Stars game on Friday and Cartoon Network Special Edition: NBA All-Star Slam Dunk Contest on Sunday.

Diament said WBD encourages advertisers to sponsor events across the weekend and across platforms. WBD is selling NBA All-Star inventory on cable, digital and streaming platforms, plus live events in Utah, where the game is being held. Many of those live, in-person events get televised, he added.

“We are having a lot of fan activations. It’s a very sophisticated plan that we put together with many of our sponsors,” Diament said.

In one activation, Shaquille O’Neal, the NBA legend who is now part of TNT’s Inside the NBA crew, will demonstrate AT&T’s 5G service from the arena floor.

O’Neal and the rest of the Inside the NBA cast — Kenny Smith, Charles Barkley, Ernie Johnson and Golden State Warriors player Draymond Green — will be host a simulcast of the game on TBS similar to ESPN’s NFL Monday Night Football “Manningcast.”

Other key sponsorships include:

• Kia is presenting the All-Star Game.
• Carmax will present the 90-minute All-Star Tip-Off Show.
• AT&T is presenting the second NBA HBCU Classic on Saturday.
• State Farm is presenting All-Star Saturday Night, with the Kia All-Star Skill Challenge, the Starry 3-Point Contest and the AT&T Slam Dunk Contest.
• The “NBA on TNT American Express Road Show” takes place in downtown Salt Lake City on Thursday. 
• And B/R Utah on Sunday features a Skills Challenge presented by State Farm.

At this year’s All-Star Game, one of the announcers will be female hoops legend Candace Parker.

“Sports is the new primetime,” he said. Very few NBA sponsors are looking to reach men exclusively as female viewership of big games is substantial. “Most of the advertisers are just looking for adults at this point.”

Diament noted that with the confetti barely cleaned up from the Kansas City Chiefs’ victory in Super Bowl LVII, many of the advertisers in the All-Star game will be showing of their Super Bowl ad campaigns.

With the NFL season over, the NBA All-Star Game is the first in a series of big events coming up for Warner Bros. Discovery Sports, including the NBA playoffs, the NHL Stanley Cup playoffs, NCAA March Madness and the beginning of the Major Leauge Baseball season.

“It’s the kickoff to our company’s dominance in sports in the second quarter,’ Diamant said, adding that it was too soon to gauge the strength of the second-quarter market. “We encourage advertisers to buy all season long, and second quarter is really significant for us.” ■

Fox News continued its February ratings roll, keeping its streak of weekly primetime and total day wins during the month in tact this past week.

Fox News, led by its coverage of the New Hampshire Primary, averaged 3.2 million viewers in primetime to finish first among all cable networks for the week of Feb. 10 to Feb. 16, according to Nielsen. TNT’s coverage of the Feb. 14-16 NBA All-Star Weekend helped the network secure a second place finish with 2.1 million viewers.

MSNBC (1.6 million viewers), HGTV (1.2 million) and History (1.1 million) rounded out the top five most watched networks of the week.

In total day, Fox News drew 1.7 million viewers, easily topping TNT, MSNBC, HGTV and History, according to Nielsen. 

Much of the notable President’s Day weekend programming is airing live from New York, at a uniquely relevant time, with networks giving viewers on-air and online tastes of the city’s cultural diversity.

From Lincoln Center to Rockefeller Center, Madison Square Garden to Brooklyn’s Barclays Center (and back again), TV network and production teams are running all over town to cover the runways of Fashion Week, the show ring at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, the NBA 2015 All Star Weekend and the 40th anniversary of cultural institution Saturday Night Live.

The most anticipated is Sunday’s three-and-a-half hour SNL40, NBC’s on-air birthday party for the show that made “Live from New York” an iconic phrase. Originally scheduled to last three hours, NBC said late Thursday the special would go an extra 30 minutes; the network then continued over the next few days to announce a growing A-list of returning cast members and favorite hosts who will join the show.

In addition to ample advance coverage on NBC’s local affiliates and national news programs, SNL40 has benefitted from buttress marketing; NBC released an SNL app on Thursday, while the Tribeca Film Festival announced it will open its 14th annual edition on April 15 with the SNL documentary Live From New York.

The live broadcast begins at 8 p.m. (ET) Sunday (Feb. 15) from Studio 8H at 30 Rock, following a 7 p.m. live red-carpet lead-in hosted by the Today team.

SNL40’s red carpet-worthy all-star line-up rivals the NBA’s All-Star roster, which hits the court 30 minutes later across the river and across the cable dial on TNT and TBS. The Turner networks are simulcasting the 64th NBA All-Star Game at 8:30 p.m., with Marv Alpert, Reggie Miller and Chris Webber calling the game from Barclays Center. That follows a live pre-game concert on TNT at 6 p.m. (ET) and the pre-game show at 7 p.m. (ET). TNT also has its own Saturday night live line-up tonight (Feb. 14) with NBA Tip-Off at 8 p.m. (ET) and All-Star Saturday Night at 9 p.m., both originating from New York.

ESPN and TNT got the live coverage of the NBA All-Star Weekend going on Friday night (Feb. 13), with the sports network’s 7 p.m. (ET) broadcast of the Sprint NBA All-Star Celebrity Game 2015 from MSG and TNT’s 9 p.m. broadcast of the BBVA Compass Rising Stars Challenge from Barclays Center.

Back at Madison Square Garden, a wholly different kind of competition will unfold live on CNBC Monday night (Feb. 16). As the three-day weekend winds down, the evening portion of the 139th Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show gets underway at 8 p.m. (ET) with Best of Breed judging of the hound, toy, non-sporting and herding groups. Perennial voice of the show (this is his 26th year) David Frei and NBC Sports analyst Mary Carillo will co-host, with NBCSN’s Kelli Stavast reporting from the floor.

The same crew is back Tuesday night (Feb. 17), when USA has the live broadcast of the finale, including the sporting, working and terrier groups plus Best in Show. Meanwhile, from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on both days, Westminster will livestream judging of all 192 breeds — taking place at Piers 92 and 94 on the Hudson River — on its website and via the 2015 Westminster Show App for Android and iOS devices.

FoxSports 1 is also going to the dogs. On Sunday at 12 p.m. (ET), it will air taped coverage of the championship round in Westminster’s 2nd Annual Masters Agility Championship, which takes place Saturday at Pier 94. The network’s Justin Kutcher and Jennifer Hale, along with dog behaviorist Cesar Millan and dog agility trainer and competitor Terry Simons, will call the event.

Meanwhile, on Manhattan’s Upper West Side, E! Entertainment’s newly unified News & Digital unit is covering the catwalk at New York Fashion Week, where it kicked off its live coverage on Feb. 12 and will continue through Feb. 18. E! Online is livestreaming exclusive runway shows at its Fashion Week microsite and the nightly E! News is taping on-location under the tents at Lincoln Center. Additionally, Fashion Police will tape a special episode in New York to air Monday night at 9 p.m., and the network is producing an on-location Secrets of Fashion Week special to air next Thursday (Feb. 19) at 8 p.m.

As the pro basketball world descends on the Big Apple, NBA All-Star 2015 begins to hit its stride with a pair of televised games on Friday night.

For the 11th straight year, ESPN will twin grins and profile on its exclusive coverage of the Sprint NBA All-Star Celebrity Game 2015 on Feb. 13 at 7 p.m. (ET) from Madison Square Garden.

Mark Jones and analyst Jon Barry will provide commentary on the proceedings that will feature perennial Celebrity Game MVP and comic Kevin Hart, Anthony Anderson (ABC’s Black-ish), Little League sensation Mo’ne Davis and Brooklyn’s own and Basketball Hall of Famer Chris Mullin.

Sage Steele (NBA Countdown) will host ESPN’s coverage, while Cassidy Hubbarth (NBA Tonight) will serve as the sideline reporter. ESPN Radio and ESPN2’s Mike Greenberg and Mike Golic (Mike & Mike) are the opposing coaches, with Greeney paired with New York Knicks’ star Carmelo Anthony, and the former NFLer joined by the Knicks’ top fan Spike Lee.

TNT will pick up the rock on a much higher level of play from the Barclays Center in Brookly at 9 p.m., with  exclusive live coverage of the BBVA Compass Rising Stars Challenge. This year’s event will feature a new USA vs. World format with some of the league’s top young talent in action, including Minnesota’s Andrew Wiggins, Philadelphia’s Michael Carter-Williams, Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo and Orlando’s Victor Oladipo.

The Inside the NBA presented by Kia studio team of Ernie Johnson, Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith and Shaq O’Neal will provide halftime and post-game analysis of what undoubtedly will be some high-flying, high-scoring action live from Hammerstein Ballroom.