Intro
Just following up on some recent posts about the NBA In-Season Tournament and the general attitude that this sub seems to have (i.e. the tournament has been a massive success and anyone that doesn’t think so is an idiot who hates fun).
Numbers to Keep In Mind (TV Ratings)
Opening Day: ~2.5m
Christmas: ~4m
Finals: ~12m
Tournament (So Far): ~1.7m
Breaking Down the Tournament Numbers
- Only 37/60 games have been played so far entering Tuesday.
- Ratings are “up” 55% when compared to games in a similar window last year.
- NOTE: The comparison does not seem to be rigorous, only surface level. For example, it was reported that the NBA saw a 73% increase in the tournament game between PHO vs. LAL than last year’s game which was between MIL vs. MIN. It seems a bit simplistic to compare a game between Lebron vs. KD to a game last year with MIL vs. MIN (i.e. if Lebron and KD faced off last year in a similar window then the increase in TV ratings this year would probably not be as high as 73%). However, it is possible for a reverse effect to take place (i.e. a better game was played in last year’s window compared to this year’s window) so let’s just accept the increase at face value.
- Even taking the increase in TV ratings at face value, the tournament is not as popular as opening day, let alone Christmas games.
- NOTE: The most important tournament games have not been played yet. It’s likely we get some increased viewership during the final group stage game and also during the knockout rounds.
False Assumptions
Here are some common assumptions I see that I don’t think have sound reasoning:
- The tournament is just like tournaments in soccer (i.e. domestic cups, Champions League).
- The tournament will get more popular as time goes on.
Reasoning
- I’m not a huge soccer fan, so if anyone else would like to chime in feel free. From my understanding, the reason why domestic cups are exciting is because you are playing against teams you wouldn’t normally play in your “regular season”. For example, in England if you are in the Premier League you are only playing against a subset of English teams (supposedly the best teams in England). However, the FA cup actually has you play against all the English teams, so the winner of it can claim to be the best club in the country. This is similar for other domestic cups in Spain, Germany, France, etc. Similarly, the Champions League allows the best clubs to compete internationally to see who’s the best in Europe. This is not comparable to the NBA because it’s the same 30 teams playing each other. If you want to see who’s the best team in the NBA you have to wait until June not December.
- This leads to the second point. Why would the tournament magically get better as it goes on? You could see why the soccer tournaments get better as they go on because there’s actually something you’re playing for. But the NBA tournament does not have anything meaningful. If you want to see who’s the best team in the NBA that’s decided in the Finals. If you want to see who’s the best team in North America/the World then the NBA is not playing teams outside the league (ex. college teams, G-League teams, international teams). Thus it’s not clear why the tournament would get more popular as time goes on. It’s possible it just follows a box-office pattern (i.e. strong in the beginning but fades as time goes on).
Subjective Experience
- My enjoyment of the tournament has followed a box-office pattern. From a Raptors fan perspective, the first game was a close, competitive, exciting home-game that we narrowly lost. My interest was high and I was excited to see how the rest of the tournament played out. Our second game we got blown out, on the road and are now probably knocked out. I don’t have as much excitement in watching the final two tournament games.
- As a neutral fan watching some other teams it was also exciting at the start but once the novelty wore off my interest started to fade. For example, the first slate of tournament games on November 3rd were all close and exciting to watch. However, as the tournament went on we’ve seen more blow outs and the novelty has kinda worn out. I just finished watching Lakers vs. Jazz and it wasn’t that great of a game. Obviously close games are exciting but blow-outs aren’t more exciting just because it’s a tournament game.
- The courts are legitimately bad. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is affecting ratings. It’s hard to track players sometimes and I don’t need bright colors to keep my attention like I’m a child.
- Once my team is out, I don’t really care who wins in Vegas. Compared to the Finals, I still follow the NBA when my team gets eliminated because I want to see who wins the LOB.
- The point differential doesn’t necessarily make the end of games more exciting (just look at TOR-ORL and LAL-UTA for examples from yesterday).
- The tournament being played on Tuesdays/Fridays kind of ruins the flow of it. Especially when they didn’t play on election night Tuesday.
The whole thing is a scam to try to extract more TV money out of bidders. It is new and they made it visually different so people would notice. The reality is the whole thing is a goofy gimmick that isn’t going to continue to motivate players going forward. They are going along with the farse because it may benefit them financially down the road. The 500k is nice, but the real money is in the TV deal.
The champions league is more like the NBA playoffs, not the in season tournament.
The in season tournament is more like the league cup, or even the FA cup.
People count trophies and add it to their cabinet. In the NBA we only do that for players but now we can do it for teams too.
As for you not caring because you’re almost out, that’s when you should care the most. You now really need your team to win, as if you put money on it, and that makes it more exciting.
Damn, why’d the mods remove this?
Winning a cup is something exciting, even if your team isn’t going to win a league. If you win both it’s better than winning just one thing and if your just winning the cup you won at least something. It’s less important than a league and in this case the Nba championship, but it’s the next best thing.
That basically means that fans can celebrate a secondary objective, which can be nice if they’re chance at winning the league is low. In the case of the Nba, teams like the Pistons, Rockets or Magic are far from championship contenders if we are honest.
A cup were some teams might overperform in a knockout game could be a chance for those teams to do something relevant. As a Piston fan you are unlikely to see your team win anything other than the new tournament for years, so it’s a slim hope of celebrating success.
This kind of leads to a problem with the current setup as well. Since games are part of the regular season as well it can get hard to distinguish between new tournament and regular season. If you completely separate them it also allows teams to focus on winning either the nba championship, the new tournament or both which could make things more interesting.
How is viewership overall (i.e. non-tournament mid-week games?).
Personally, I’ve tuned in to at least a few more Thursday evening NBA games (some of them in-season tournament games) simply because the competing NFL matchups have been really underwhelming. I’m certainly not specifically seeking out IST games. Not sure how many viewers are in that category, but it’s not zero.
I only watch my favorite team and couldn’t give a flying fuck about arbitrarily declaring random regular season games a “tournament game”
Useless BS that only the easily distracted care about. Ooo look a shiny object…
it’s impossible to look at 55% increase as anything other than an enormous success.
i’d be interested in how they can keep it interesting season over season. if it becomes sort of a prestige thing, players would buy in even more than just the extra chunk of change they get. would be awesome to get like an international tourney too just to settle those debates about “world champion”
I’ve been doing my part and refusing watch any in season tournament games. Hopefully we can all work together to get this thing shut down.
It will get better ,nobody expected it to be good right from the jump , it’s a cultural thing. But pls Adam silver get rid of those fckin courts,my eyes were bleeding from that Chicago court
I am enjoying the new twist.
Yes it’s been insanely successful. r/nba was totally and completely wrong. Again.
Tldr?
Just anecdotal, but the people I know who only watch playoffs aren’t watching still. Maybe they will when it gets closer to the championship?
Seems like the players care though, so that’s cool.
The courts are so bad that I actually feel bad for the players having to navigate them. The digital ads constantly changing the color of the floor. The solid colors so you can really see where the floorboards are and it makes the sharp lines on the floor much harder to notice.
Successful in making me want to actively not watch 90% of the games I may have watched otherwise because of a hideous court that’ll give me a headache, sure.