Has NBA basketball become boring? At least that’s the verdict of the former basket system destroyer-force of nature Shaquille O’Neal – and no, it’s not a what-were-we-used-to-be-exciting verdict of the former hero who tries to change the past and thus his own by dimming the present light to make achievements shine brighter. O’Neal is now an expert Show “Inside the NBA”, which runs before, between and after games and occasionally achieves better TV ratings (up to three million) than the games themselves. O’Neal sat in front of the huge studio screen, which showed exactly what was bothering him: “We’re seeing more and more of the same: the same plays, the same throws.”
There are game scenes that have actually been seen a thousand times this season: Due to the accuracy of numerous NBA professionals, it is worthwhile for most teams to rely more on throws from beyond the three-point line. Tactically, this is easier to achieve compared to other basketball strategies simply because of the space – the line was introduced in the NBA in 1979 to equalize what is happening under the basket. Now there is this arc 25 feet from the basket with straight lines on each side; And the moves that lead to three-point attempts always look similar – even if they are sometimes highly complicated: playmaker dribbles the ball forward; desired thrower is unlocked; Passport; maybe another passport; litter. “This is boring,” says O’Neal; no one wants to see 48 minutes of throwing practice.
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That’s right, the numbers don’t lie: December 25th used to belong to the NBA. The NHL ice hockey league is deliberately taking a break from the 24th to the 26th, and baseball is having a winter break anyway. The NFL football league only played games sporadically until 2020. This year transferred Netflix two NFL Christmas games, each watched by more than 24 million Americans. The five NBA games: average 5.16 million; the game between the Denver Nuggets and the Phoenix Suns the night football was over was watched by only 3.8 million. Overall, TV ratings have fallen by 19 percent compared to the previous year.
In its (very successful) quest to make this league as valuable a product as possible, the NBA has forgotten the evolution of the sport. From 2014 onwards, the “Three Point Revolution” was a show, the spectacle of the Golden State Warriors: coach Steve Kerr, the sniper for the Chicago Bulls of the Jordan-Pippen-Rodman era at the end of the 1990s, turned Steph Curry and Klay Thompson into them so-called “Splash Brothers” who literally rained shots onto the basket from beyond the three-point line. This not only had style, but was also considered statistically comprehensible and therefore smart due to the risk-reward calculation. Golden State won four titles between 2015 and 2022.
The Warriors recently set a record against the Mavericks: 48 combined three-pointers
It was a new era to which there is usually a counter-trend in sports when opposing tactics foxes come up with something. If that doesn’t happen, there are rule changes like the back pass rule in football in 1992 or the changed kick-off in football today. The NFL is already a master at constantly changing the rules to accommodate changes in athleticism, risk of injury or strategies. There is no counter-trend, on the contrary: in the season after the introduction of the three-point line, 2.8 percent of the throws came from beyond the three-point line. In 2011 it was 18 percent; Currently there are almost 40, the Boston Celtics are at 50.5 percent. The Warriors recently set a record against the Mavericks: 48 combined three-pointers. Two days before that, at Charlotte against Chicago, a record on the other side of the spectrum: a total of 75 missed attempts.
“Sound” instead of “Splash”. It’s not boring, it’s a punishment for really bad people who have to watch it in its entirety.
Why doesn’t the NBA intervene? Of course, there is no easy solution in sight, because what could you do: move the three-man line backwards? Would equalize the game even more! An intermediate field for half-distance throws that would be worth three points and the current three-pointers four points? Way too complicated!
It’s not such a bold thesis: The NBA doesn’t do anything because it doesn’t have to do anything – because financially it could hardly be doing better. Global sales this season are expected to be almost twelve billion dollars, more than ever before. The new rights contract will apply from the summer break and will bring almost seven billion dollars into the coffers per season – more than two and a half times as much as before; Every season game should be available worldwide via streaming portals.
The league deliberately does not rely on its 48-minute games, but rather on social media snippets
The shop is booming, especially internationally, which is also due to the 125 non-US professionals from 43 countries – both are records. “75 percent of our TV viewers are outside the USA,” said deputy league boss Mark Tatum in the summer: “We are only scratching the surface.” The ponds in which the NBA fishes are many and large. It’s a bit like the tennis boom of the 1980s in Germany, which was actually more of a Boris and Steffi boom. Serbs watch Nikola Jokic, Greeks Giannis Antetokounmpo; the Germans the currently injured Wagner brothers Moritz and Franz at Orlando Magic or Dennis Schröder, who has just moved to Steph Curry and his Golden State Warriors.
Shortly before Christmas, league boss Adam Silver countered the accusation that the three-point revolution was now a three-way wasteland: “We have more social media users than any other league – and are growing exponentially in this area.” The case of TV In his opinion, quotas have “nothing to do with a lack of interest in the game”. Meaning: What are the live TV ratings in the USA? It works everywhere else! In the era of low attention spans, the NBA deliberately does not rely on 48-minute games, but rather on social media snippets: highlights, results, statistics (and maybe records, it doesn’t hurt), plus pop culture like clothes of the stars along the way to the locker room and cooperation with the betting providers – those who bet on games want to know how they turn out.
The message behind it is clear, and at least in the NBA they don’t pretend otherwise: the development of the product is more important than the evolution of the game. This obviously has to cleanse itself, and this can certainly be seen as a call to tactical tinkerers to finally invent the counter-trend to the three-way wasteland.
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