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Fightin' Words: Is the NBA Becoming a Niche Sport?
Spotlight Series posted 3/25/2008 from ballhype.com
Welcome to the BallHype Spotlight Series, Volume 3: Fightin' Words, a series of debates on sporting subjects vital and trivial. In this edition, Dan Shanoff of DanShanoff.com and The Sporting Blog argues that the NBA is becoming a niche sport. His opponent: Tom Ziller of NBA FanHouse and Sactown Royalty. Enjoy.
Shanoff: The once-hallowed "Big Four" (NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL) is now a "Big Three" (NFL, College Football, MLB) with the NHL, at most, a very popular niche sport -- and the NBA quickly joining them.
The only reason people think that the NBA is still one of the "Big" sports is because it USED to be a "Big" sport and thus all of the media coverage -- mainstream and blog -- is filled with people who care, even if most of America doesn't anymore. Just because Bill Simmons and Michael Wilbon care about the NBA more than any other sport doesn't mean that most sports fans do, too.
The NBA is closer to NASCAR than it is to the NFL, with a very dedicated (but very finite) audience.
Ziller: Saying the NBA is closer to NASCAR than the NFL is disingenuous, because MLB and NCAA Football are both closer to NASCAR than the NFL, too. The NFL is a megalith, and no sport in the United States approaches it in terms of the market, potential and actual.
Not to pull the race card, but doesn't the NBA have the advantage to cross demographic lines where the NHL is rather limited? We know the NBA had a ton of white fans at one point; those would seem to be the ones who went away. The league has not shut those fans off completely, as I think we're seeing with the increased ratings as the epic playoff race heats up. A compelling product will get these fans to come back, while the core demographic (blacks, younger whites) will always be there.
Is the NHL ever expanding outside the white male demo? I'm not thinking so.
While the NBA might be two tiers below the NFL and MLB in popularity (I'm not conceding position to NCAA Football at this point -- there are vast swaths of this country that are oblivious to the sport), it has the opportunity to once again rise. I think this spring will prove that.
Shanoff: Please consider that the most recent NBA Finals featured the best (and most marketable) individual player in the league (forget the fact that it also featured a multiple-time champion that "purists" seem to think play the game the "right way"), and it managed to be the least-watched NBA Finals ever. I wouldn't confuse the very loud echo chamber of the devoted (the Simmons/Wilbon Effect) to nationwide interest.
Ziller: No matter what way is the right way, there's an easy answer to this: The Spurs and Cavaliers both play the slow way. They also both play the defense-based way. As soon as the Conference Finals finished, everyone knew this'd be a bad Finals for the viewing audience. LeBron, the Spurs... who cares? It was two of the slowest-paced, defensively-skewed teams in the league. Maybe the presence of such teams (Portland looks to be the next generation) is an inherent flaw of the game, but it can hardly discount the fabulous postseason the NBA experienced on the whole.
Shanoff: Here's the thing: There is one -- ONE -- NBA Finals match up that has a prayer of national interest: Lakers-Celtics. Anything else will rate roughly what last year's Finals did, even if one of the participants is either the Lakers or Celtics. And even if it IS Lakers-Celtics, if it doesn't show substantial improvement over ratings this decade, that would confirm that the NBA is sliding into niche-dom.
The NFL and college football are the only sports that maintain week-in-week-out national attention -- sustained national attention. Even baseball seems to peak in April, with a lull until September/October. It's apples and oranges: If the NBA had one game a week (on the same day) for 16 weeks, you bet ratings would go up. Football's system is set up for national attention sustained over 4 months. NASCAR's weekly
set-up helps drive is success.
Every other sport is fighting for relevance, ranging from 3 weeks (NCAA Hoops) to 4 weekends per year (golf/tennis) to a single day (Arena Football, let's say).
The NBA has become a 3-moment-a-year sport: NBA Draft Night, NBA All-Star Weekend and the good fortune of a compelling Game 7 during
the playoffs.
Ziller: I heartily disagree the league's become a three-moment enterprise. Golden State-Dallas? Golden State-Utah? Phoenix-San Antonio? Even Phoenix-Lakers was an event! Detroit-Cleveland? The postseason is a two-month long series of huge moments. Everyone -- NBA fanatic or not -- talked about Game 5 of Cleveland-Detroit. Everyone -- NBA fanatic or not -- talked about GSW-Dallas.
If the NBA has slipped into nichedom in the past year, that is a mighty big niche.
Shanoff: GSW-DAL was a one-time thing: A novelty. And CLE-DET was, again, one moment, as good as it was. That brings you to 5 moments in a calendar year for the NBA, with 2 being spontaneous and unrepeatable. The NBA playoffs are a grind, and are only talked about by existing NBA fans, with the rare exceptional moment -- please keep in mind ESPN's role (and vested interest) in pushing/creating/manufacturing those moments. That's just the reality of sports, but it doesn't create a larger pie.
Ziller: If those huge NBA moments -- which had everyone in the world talking -- are novelties, why do they keep happening? This NBA stretch run and postseason... is this going to be a product of a series of well-timed flukes, or is it the product of an amazing (and growing) talent base, a stunning visual product on many nights, and smart league marketing via rule changes?
Shanoff: Here's the question: Economics aside, would the NBA be better off with their current "tentpole" strategy (5-6 individual nights of the year as "events" with lots of space in between them) or, like college basketball, a situation where they simply owned 3 straights weeks of the year, with very little national, non-avid fan attention paid beyond that. Again, economics muddles the argument.
Ziller: Let's not overblow the NCAAs. How many casual fans check out after two weeks, when their bracket's in the toilet? Yes, it completely owns two weeks in March (beginning on Selection Sunday). But the Final Four loses steam among the casual fan (with Nielsen ratings comparable to the worst NBA finals of all-time); if you don't have a rooting interest or there isn't the rare compelling storyline (Carmelo Anthony, for example), the Final Four isn't going to capture you like the championships for most other sports. So basically, if this theory's right, the entire basis of college basketball's popularity is based completely on the novelty of a bracket.
Regarding your question, here's the thing: The NBA went through a bad spell, with few compelling stories beyond the Lakers, the Kings, and Vince Carter. It is clearly on the rise, and has been since last season. The beauty of the so-called "tentpole" strategy: You never know which night these big moments will happen. Kobe can drop 81 on League Pass. Denver could score 168 on some random Sunday. The Rockets -- a 10th place team -- can run off 22 wins in a row. At some point, the fan base created on the backs of these moments will get hooked into watching more often; the compelling product will keep folks watching when little is at stake because, hey!, you never know when something fun will happen. This is why ratings are improving this year for the NBA: The product is getting better, and it's the strategy which has allowed this.
Is the NBA becoming a niche sport? Is it the clear #3 sport now and in the future? Should Shanoff be disbarred? Should Ziller be disrobed? Discuss below, or where ever. It's your life.
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