these are one off incidents in selected arenas. there wasn't a sweeping ban of these messages across the nba, in fact many attendees had pro-HK shirts and were never bothered.

Moreover, i would not be able to enter an arena with a MAGA, Trump, or a Biden poster (altough there was one incident with someone with a MAGA hat), so to imply that these one off incidents are actions that are due to the extensions of the CCP is very much in line with the propagandic rallying cry that we are seeing against China right now.

I agree with OP, this is much more of a financial issue to the NBA, than the NBA being an extension of the CCP which you are trying to imply right now.

I don't see those two things as being materially different. If the CCP is going to mess with their finances unless they make the right noises, that's a chilling effect.