In 2025, Underdog set out to continue positioning itself as a reliable source for clear analysis of NBA news with the start of its NBA Salary Cap series. The goal was simple: to help NBA fans easily understand each team’s unique salary cap situation, which are notoriously complex each year. Unlike other leagues, the NBA has a soft cap, which allows teams to go above the salary cap in exchange for reduced privileges in free agency. There are also two tax aprons for those teams that go above a certain amount of money - meaning each team’s situation is constantly in flux and unique year-to-year. The series also served the dual purpose of keeping fans engaged and giving them insightful content to interact with during the offseason, maintaining their connection to the brand year-round.
We partnered with Ben (NBA Recap) to bring clarity to complicated NBA stats and storylines through his graphic-driven videos, a format that aligns perfectly with our brand and our ball-knowing audience.
As the summer was nearing, we realized a need within the NBA community to understand the new Second Apron rule that was confusing so many fans and what that could mean for their teams. We pitched Ben on breaking down the Boston Celtics' salary cap situation, visually mapping out the salary floor, cap, luxury tax, and both aprons. He clearly walked through the moves they made to get under the second apron and explained the penalties they would have faced had they stayed above it, turning a complicated rule into something digestible and genuinely engaging.
That video got 2.5 million views and 155k likes on TikTok alone, and we knew we might have something great on our hands. When the next video based around the Rockets' salary cap got 3.5 million views and 248k likes on TikTok, we knew we had struck gold. We proceeded to do a video on all 30 NBA teams, reaching over 26 million views on TikTok alone, with our lowest-performing video still cresting over 250k views.
This initiative speaks to the collaborative partnerships we build with sports creators to bring our audience the highest quality sports content. We don't just ask them to post ads, think of all the ideas on their own, or do everything we say! It's truly a collaborative effort to create content that sports fans actually want.
The series was a success all around, with over 17 million views and 1 million engagements on TikTok.