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NBA Finals Opener Does Record 13.1 Rating on ABC

And by contrast the Stanley Cup hockey finals aren't doing as well:

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/ne...nley-cup-final-faces-ratings-obstacles/157044

One can talk about having teams from major markets, but another issue is character development. Sports TV is no different from other TV shows. People are attracted to characters and story lines. Basketball has done a better job of building characters with Lebron James than hockey with Sidney Crosby. We see that in other sports, like golf with Tiger Woods or NASCAR with Jeff Gordon and Dale Jr. Once those recognizable characters go away, so does the audience.
 
TheBigA said:
And by contrast the Stanley Cup hockey finals aren't doing as well:

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/ne...nley-cup-final-faces-ratings-obstacles/157044

One can talk about having teams from major markets, but another issue is character development. Sports TV is no different from other TV shows. People are attracted to characters and story lines. Basketball has done a better job of building characters with Lebron James than hockey with Sidney Crosby. We see that in other sports, like golf with Tiger Woods or NASCAR with Jeff Gordon and Dale Jr. Once those recognizable characters go away, so does the audience.
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True too and very expected Bay Area Sports Pundits talking about how much a threat Lebron Poses to the "Splash Brothers" (Curry and Thompson). National Sports Pundits side with Lebron and call him "The King". Its the Pundits on NBC Sports Bay Area, KNBR Sports/Talk, ESPN and Fox Sports that show their emotions on which players, teams and coaches to pick on their talk shows that drive up "character building" of their targets.

Also Bay Area sports Pundits and Pittsburgh Sports Pundits talk about how their side should compete in the NHL Stanley cup. There is character building there too but mainly on the local level not on the national level we are seeing with the NBA though.
 
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TheBigA said:
And by contrast the Stanley Cup hockey finals aren't doing as well:

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/ne...nley-cup-final-faces-ratings-obstacles/157044
Click to expand...

The NHL just will never get a big audience unless the teams are from the East Coast or Great Lakes regions, or are the LA Kings (See: The last 8 Finals, with Chicago, LA, Boston, Pittsburgh, and Detroit winning one or more Stanley Cups each). NBC got lucky with the Penguins this year, but San Jose is a nonentity regardless of how good they are. I wouldn't have been shocked if NBC moved the entire series to NBCSN if Tampa Bay had beaten Pittsburgh. Sun Belt just doesn't work in hockey.

One can talk about having teams from major markets, but another issue is character development. Sports TV is no different from other TV shows. People are attracted to characters and story lines. Basketball has done a better job of building characters with Lebron James than hockey with Sidney Crosby. We see that in other sports, like golf with Tiger Woods or NASCAR with Jeff Gordon and Dale Jr. Once those recognizable characters go away, so does the audience.
Click to expand...

Those "recognizable characters" are or were also among the best in their respective sports. Once they fall from the top, they don't draw the audience they used to, other than people who like to watch train wrecks. Tiger Woods and Kobe Bryant come to mind immediately. Peyton Manning came close, but was smart enough to quit while on top.

It also has a lot to do with the fact that the Warriors and Cavs are the two best teams in the NBA, with the two best players in the league and supporting casts like the great Celtics, Lakers, and Bulls teams had in their heydays.

People expect top quality play in the postseason. Most of the preceding rounds of the playoffs were a joke because the league just isn't anywhere as good as it was in the Golden Age of the NBA (1979-1998), and it may never be again. There are only four really good teams worth watching in the league right now -- Cleveland, Golden State, OKC, and the LA Clippers, and the Clippers went down early due to injuries. I might add the Spurs, but they're aging. Then look at the top-market teams that are completely in the tank (Knicks, Nets, Lakers, Sixers) or are just mediocre (Bulls, Pistons, Wizards, Mavs, Rockets). These have been among the greatest teams of all time, and were (still are for some reason other than market size?) attractive to the networks and advertisers, but they stink on ice now.
 
KeithE4 said:
The NHL just will never get a big audience
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You could have stopped there. It has nothing to do with the market size. The NY Rangers, the LA Kings, and the Chicago Black Hawks have each gotten to the finals in recent years, and the ratings haven't been as large as the NBA. Hockey is soccer on ice. That says it all.
 
KeithE4 said:
I wouldn't have been shocked if NBC moved the entire series to NBCSN if Tampa Bay had beaten Pittsburgh. Sun Belt just doesn't work in hockey.
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I would have - pretty sure NBC is contractually obligated to carry some number of Stanley Cup Finals games.
 
KeithE4 said:
Those "recognizable characters" are or were also among the best in their respective sports.
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Maybe. You can't tell me that Jordan Spieth isn't among the best golfers today. But he doesn't draw a crowd like Tiger Woods. Character development.

I'm reading a lot of obits about Muhammad Ali. Sure he was a great boxer, in the tradition of other great boxers. But he was also a character. How many current boxers can claim the kind of attention he got? The entire sport of boxing has become an afterthought in the last 20 years, because the boxers themselves aren't as personable as George Foreman or Muhammad Ali. Just being the best in your respective sport isn't enough. To attract an audience, you have to be a character that people recognize, like a brand name.
 
TheBigA said:
Actually tonight's game is on NBC Sports Channel.
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the contract says the finals has 2 games on NBC SN. Has been like that since the OLN Days. What made this year interesting is NBC decided that either game 3 OR 4 would be on NBC SN depending on the previous scores. Since Pittsburgh is up 2-0 they (NBC/NHL) didnt want the series to possibly end on cable. So they put game 3 on cable and 4 on is on NBC. Had the series been 1-1, tonights game would be on NBC and game 4 would have been on NBC SN.

games have been split on OTA & cable since 95

In 1995, Fox signed on to be the exclusive national broadcast network of selected games of the final round, splitting it with ESPN. This splitting of exclusive national coverage on cable/broadcast networks remains, first being passed to ABC and ESPN in 2000, and then NBC and Versus (now NBCSN) in 2006.
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In 1995, Fox signed on to be the exclusive national broadcast network of selected games of the final round, splitting it with ESPN. This splitting of exclusive national coverage on cable/broadcast networks remains, first being passed to ABC and ESPN in 2000, and then NBC and Versus (now NBCSN) in 2006.
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Is that from Wikipedia? Where's the link?
 
KeithE4 said:
The NHL just will never get a big audience unless the teams are from the East Coast or Great Lakes regions, or are the LA Kings (See: The last 8 Finals, with Chicago, LA, Boston, Pittsburgh, and Detroit winning one or more Stanley Cups each). NBC got lucky with the Penguins this year, but San Jose is a nonentity regardless of how good they are. I wouldn't have been shocked if NBC moved the entire series to NBCSN if Tampa Bay had beaten Pittsburgh. Sun Belt just doesn't work in hockey.



Those "recognizable characters" are or were also among the best in their respective sports. Once they fall from the top, they don't draw the audience they used to, other than people who like to watch train wrecks. Tiger Woods and Kobe Bryant come to mind immediately. Peyton Manning came close, but was smart enough to quit while on top.

It also has a lot to do with the fact that the Warriors and Cavs are the two best teams in the NBA, with the two best players in the league and supporting casts like the great Celtics, Lakers, and Bulls teams had in their heydays.

People expect top quality play in the postseason. Most of the preceding rounds of the playoffs were a joke because the league just isn't anywhere as good as it was in the Golden Age of the NBA (1979-1998), and it may never be again. There are only four really good teams worth watching in the league right now -- Cleveland, Golden State, OKC, and the LA Clippers, and the Clippers went down early due to injuries. I might add the Spurs, but they're aging. Then look at the top-market teams that are completely in the tank (Knicks, Nets, Lakers, Sixers) or are just mediocre (Bulls, Pistons, Wizards, Mavs, Rockets). These have been among the greatest teams of all time, and were (still are for some reason other than market size?) attractive to the networks and advertisers, but they stink on ice now.
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If the 19 year Golden era for the NBA ended in 1998 what is this era of the NBA (1998-present)?
 
TVCOOL said:
If the 19 year Golden era for the NBA ended in 1998 what is this era of the NBA (1998-present)?
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Certainly not anything close to another Golden Age. Probably closer to what the league was at the time of the merger, only with much better marketing.

Edit: I'll take the latter part back. There were probably as many Hall-of-Fame players in the '70s as there were in the Magic/Bird/Jordan era, but split between two leagues until 1976.

Right now, I can't see all that many of today's players heading for Springfield compared to decades past, but we'll see. The "post-Golden Age" group is just now starting to get a few players into the Hall -- Shaq (who straddles both eras), Iverson, and Yao Ming are among this year's inductees.
 
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TVCOOL said:
I meant the post-golden era 1999-present.
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To sum it up: LeBron James and Steff Curry are about the only guys in the league today qualified to carry Magic's, Bird's, or MJ's basketball.
 
KeithE4 said:
To sum it up: LeBron James and Steff Curry are about the only guys in the league today qualified to carry Magic's, Bird's, or MJ's basketball.
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Hmmm...perhaps expansion has diluted the impact of other current players, because there certainly are more than two, except they play for teams you don't hear about. As I said, character development.
 
The NBA's current collective bargaining agreement tends to send the top stars to cities where they want to go. This is why LeBron is back in Cleveland. The CBA imposes a maximum pay package not just on each team as had been the case, but on each player individually. So now matter how much money the Lakers are willing to spend, they have had very little success getting free agents to come to LA.

And you're more likely to hear about the Lakers or Knicks on ESPN because "big market", even though they've both stunk for several seasons.
 
PTBoardOp94 said:
The NBA's current collective bargaining agreement tends to send the top stars to cities where they want to go. This is why LeBron is back in Cleveland. The CBA imposes a maximum pay package not just on each team as had been the case, but on each player individually. So now matter how much money the Lakers are willing to spend, they have had very little success getting free agents to come to LA.

And you're more likely to hear about the Lakers or Knicks on ESPN because "big market", even though they've both stunk for several seasons.
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As a Celtics fan, I've often been frustrated by the reluctance of top stars to come to Boston. I understand that the city's poor history in race relations and its cold weather work against it, but it's a high-profile franchise that had a nice run not that long ago, when Kevin Garnett and Ray Allen joined the team. Of course, Garnett had played his entire career in even colder weather (Minnesota) and Allen went to college in New England (UConn). I keep reading that Kevin Durant might land in Boston, but I find it hard to imagine.
 
KeithE4 said:
Certainly not anything close to another Golden Age. Probably closer to what the league was at the time of the merger, only with much better marketing.

Edit: I'll take the latter part back. There were probably as many Hall-of-Fame players in the '70s as there were in the Magic/Bird/Jordan era, but split between two leagues until 1976.

Right now, I can't see all that many of today's players heading for Springfield compared to decades past, but we'll see. The "post-Golden Age" group is just now starting to get a few players into the Hall -- Shaq (who straddles both eras), Iverson, and Yao Ming are among this year's inductees.
Click to expand...

I don't buy Yao Ming as a Hall of Famer. His career was minimized by injuries and statistically he just doesn't measure up. I have a feeling he was voted in only to goose up the ratings for the induction ceremony in China and sell more Yao merchandise there.
 
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