The Chicago Bulls’ 2025-26 regular season schedule is finally here, and the biggest storyline isn’t about opening night, long road trips, or tough stretches. It’s the fact that the Bulls will be playing on national television just three times throughout the entire season.
Yes, the team in the third-largest media market in the country will appear on national television just three times during the 2025-26 NBA season.
For one of the most iconic franchises in all of sports, it’s a complete embarrassment to the city of Chicago and one of the most loyal fan bases in the NBA to not have a product good enough to earn more national relevance than this.
The NBA's perception of the Bulls has drastically declined
The only two teams in bigger markets, the New York Knicks and Los Angeles Lakers, each have 34 nationally televised games this season, more than eleven times Chicago’s total. Even teams with similar records to the Bulls last season are getting more national recognition. The Sacramento Kings have nine, the Atlanta Hawks have thirteen, the Orlando Magic have fourteen, and even the Portland Trail Blazers have eight.
Clearly, the issue isn’t about the Bulls’ inability to have a winning season. Of the eight teams that participated in the Play-In Tournament last season, the Bulls have the fewest games reaching a nationwide audience. So what’s the difference? The teams getting more national recognition have stars, a direction, and/or a narrative worth showcasing. Right now, the Bulls have none of that.
This isn’t a dig at the players on the roster. The Bulls have some great talent; they just lack a true superstar. The real dig belongs to ownership, which hasn’t given the front office the resources to build a watchable, competitive product.
While it may not seem like a huge deal to the casual fan, the impact is bigger than it seems. Nationally televised games boost a team’s marketability, help attract free agents who want to play on the biggest stage, and keep the team in the national conversation. When the league drops a schedule for the Chicago Bulls that indirectly says, “We don’t think you’re worth showing,” it becomes a huge relevance problem.
The only way the Chicago Bulls can force themselves back into the national spotlight is by building a team with a story worth showing to the world. The Bulls need to give people a reason to watch, because right now, the NBA is telling us they’re just another NBA team. And for a franchise as significant as the Bulls, this should never be the case.