TV Schedules For Los Angeles' Two NBA Teams Announced

[Joseph_Gallant]

The NBA's two teams in Southern California, the Los Angeles Lakers, and the Los Angeles Clippers, have both released their 2005/2006 television schedules.

The Lakers, as has been traditional over the years, have all road games not on national TV (38 away games) on KCAL-9; while all home games not on national TV (32 home games) are on Fox Sports West.

The Clippers' local TV schedule is divided-up between KTLA-5 (25 games; 11 home and 14 away), Fox Sports West (7 home games) and Fox Sports West 2 (38 games; 20 home and 18 away).

Oddly enough, KCAL's schedule of Lakers' away games include the two away games against the crosstown rival Los Angeles Clippers (January 7th and February 24th), even though they will also be broadcast by KTLA as part of the Clippers' broadcast-TV package; likewise, KTLA will carry all four Clippers' games against the Lakers, including the two away games at the Lakers (November 18th and April 9th), even though those two contests will also be broadcast by FSW as part of the Lakers' cable-TV package.

This means that for the four "battles of Los Angeles", fans of each team will be able to watch the telecast (and listen to the announcers) of their favorite team.

My guess: For the two Lakers/Clippers games where the Clippers will be the home team, far more people will watch the games on KCAL than on KTLA. For the two games where the Lakers will be the home team, FSW should narrowly beat KTLA in the local ratings (dependent on cable penetration and what kind of ratings numbers Laker games usually bring to FSW).

 

[ShawnHill]

> The NBA's two teams in Southern California, the Los Angeles
> Lakers, and the Los Angeles Clippers, have both released
> their 2005/2006 television schedules.
>
> The Lakers, as has been traditional over the years, have all
> road games not on national TV (38 away games) on KCAL-9;
> while all home games not on national TV (32 home games) are
> on Fox Sports West.
>
> The Clippers' local TV schedule is divided-up between KTLA-5
> (25 games; 11 home and 14 away), Fox Sports West (7 home
> games) and Fox Sports West 2 (38 games; 20 home and 18
> away).
>
> Oddly enough, KCAL's schedule of Lakers' away games include
> the two away games against the crosstown rival Los Angeles
> Clippers (January 7th and February 24th), even though they
> will also be broadcast by KTLA as part of the Clippers'
> broadcast-TV package; likewise, KTLA will carry all four
> Clippers' games against the Lakers, including the two away
> games at the Lakers (November 18th and April 9th), even
> though those two contests will also be broadcast by FSW as
> part of the Lakers' cable-TV package.
>
> This means that for the four "battles of Los Angeles", fans
> of each team will be able to watch the telecast (and listen
> to the announcers) of their favorite team.
>
> My guess: For the two Lakers/Clippers games where the
> Clippers will be the home team, far more people will watch
> the games on KCAL than on KTLA. For the two games where the
> Lakers will be the home team, FSW should narrowly beat KTLA
> in the local ratings (dependent on cable penetration and
> what kind of ratings numbers Laker games usually bring to
> FSW).
>
The case has been the Lakers will always generate better ratings than the Clippers, and I'm a big Clippers fan. KTLA has been carrying the four head-to-head annual meetings between the Clips and Lakers each season since it reacquired the Clips over-the-air rights back in 2002. There was one telecast on KTLA in which they presented the game in HDTV, and KCAL also televised the game as well (being that it was a Laker "road" game), KCAL got nearly double the audience than KTLA did, I forget the numbers exactly. But with games, it's mostly about presentation as well as the performances for both teams at any given time. KCAL's presentation is almost network-quality, while KTLA's is OK at best (KTLA had a bunch graphical errors during its first year back, i.e. not updating the scores in time, misspelled names, etc).

When the Clips were on KCOP, from 1991 to 1996, they did a lot better job covering the games, and presently more games annually--at least 40 games a year, before it dumped the Clips for its UPN committments. The Clippers went through a period between 2000-02 where roughly half of the total games were shown locally due to a lack of contractual committment from either Fox Sports Net (in 2001-02, they only shown 45 games, while in 2002-03 they only the last 14 non-televised games on the schedule due to a late contractual signing between FSN and the Clippers). However, it should be an interesting year for both of our teams locally, with the Lakers trying to get back to respectability, while the Clips will be fighting for chance to make the playoffs for the first time since 1997