And yet advertisers still flock to all pro sports in droves because its the last thing that anybody watches "live" anymore, and actually may sit through a commercial or two. Package/rights fees go up in all sports regardless of ratings. They even tried to make the cable/regional sports networks go bankrupt... and they're going to somehow survive despite every other relic from the cable box days going belly-up or having to diversify platforms. I still think all leagues are barely scratching the surface of the extra $$$ there are with streaming and going totally on demand, but they'll eventually figure it out (took regular internet commerce awhile from the 1997-ish days to get to where they are now). And yes, there's alway a transition between "eras" where the next wave of stars are too young/raw to be household names, and the older ones are still hanging on but have noticeable decline.
Valid points, I would say in addition to the previous post, award NBA games on Netflix and it would explode as well.
Watched some highlights recently and the court was some weird color. No thanks. Also the fake midseason playoffs thing is a huge turnoff.
the NBA is still extremely popular…it gets more social media engagement than any other sport people just aren’t watching it on cable TV for a host of different reasons, and LP is legit sh*t…u can’t even watch your home team with it because of blackouts the old stars like Bron, KD, Steph, Harden carried the league for a decade+…there’s been no next group to carry the mantle
LP blackout is such a lame practice. Those who want to watch the game in person would not stop going just because they could see it on LP. Those who would not pay the ticket price to go to the arena would not decide to buy because of LP blackout. They either just don't watch or watch from other venue.
The flow of play is painful to watch between whistles, free throws, timeouts, commercials et al. the overly loud and generic arena songs/chants is also brutal
NBA: We will give you 50% off on league pass but your local game, which is all you really care about, will be blocked. Can we offer you some more glow in the dark courts?
Yup, watching live is a horrible experience. NBA league pass is ****, so only option: condensed games through illegal streaming.
They finally realized that it would never work to expand a few teams overseas and have them play in the same league. It's just not feasible. Well, that's a thought. Maybe they can start a Euro NBA with the same financial clout as the American NBA, which should be shrunk by 5 or 6 teams. Play a World Series between the champions of American NBA and Euro NBA. If the money and prestige were the same, I think most top Euro players would choose to stay in Europe.
IMO, it's partly the Warriors and LeBron's dominance waning. For 8 years the Warriors were the best team in the league, yet still the NBA felt the need to help them out via reffing (KD out of bounds, moving screens, etc.). Warriors win 1 or 2 less championships and it brings more parity to the league, giving more fans up across additional regions, thus driving up overall interests. Then the most dominant player physically in the NBA has been declining slowly the last couple years, and tbh the politics probably turned off some people too. The NBA is in a transition period right now and needs a couple of new trendsetting stars to bring the ratings up again. At this time, I don't think the NBA really has that young generational star in the league yet outside of maybe small market Wemby.
I think it's a matter of creating an NBA-branded Euroleague that could bring in 5x-6x as much revenue. It's a no-brainer irresistible proposition for both sides. I have no doubt it will be extremely successful. One possible concern is once this machine gets rolling, how much interest and revenue would be pulled from other basketball leagues in Europe. The prestige won't be the same and the top Euro players would still prefer the NBA because of the huge salary difference.
