Anonymous
Years ago

Would NBA on FTA help?

I know the stats that a lot of Aussies have League Pass etc, but... I can't help but think that even if we had 1 or 2 NBA games a week on FTA it would really boost interest in basketball generally in Australia.

I know people don't like references to the "boom" time of the 90s, but as a youngster I know watching the 1 NBA game a week and NBA Action highlights show really increased my interest in the game and made me more interested in watching my local NBL team too.

Your thoughts?

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Zodiac  
Years ago

Ten/One showed NBA games for a season a few years back they didn't rate.

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paul  
Years ago

Yep, in the past there just was not widespread enough interest to warrant a station investing in the rights for only a few thousand to watch. Having said that, I see ESPN games now getting the occasional 30-40K ratings for bigger games, in line with the NBL, which it used to only get for Finals.

So maybe interest has grown and it's worth another crack now basketball's popularity has grown in recent times and there are lot more Aussies in the league.

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PeterJohn  
Years ago

Yes.

I started following the 36ers and NBL solely due to the basketball introduction I got from Bill Palmer's NBA finals' coverage in the early 1980s.

I agree with paul's points above. I have some reservations about costs and competition though.

In the 1980s the coverage was (mostly) replays rather than live. The production costs locally would have been low (IIRC, just Palmer sitting in front of a camera to do intro and outro). There was also less competition from other sports as well. AFL was just an expanded VFL and was played on weekends. May not have been playing night AFL/SANFL games then as well. And we had no access to the USA sports channels and public internet (AARNET wasn't built until 1989).

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Anonymous  
Years ago

When Channel 10 had the rights (back in the Bill Woods/Steve Carfino days), didn't it used to be quite popular? I remember they used to have shows like "Basketball Extra" that used to combine NBL and NBA discussion.

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Baller#3  
Years ago

The only issue I see is whether or not the cost of rights outway the potential audience and reward. Particularly on weekdays.

With ESPN having the rights to a lot of games as well. Is it possible to even get enough high quality games shown on weekends when I would imagine it would rate best.

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AD  
Years ago

It's an interesting question.

The problem in discussing this, is that so many Basketball fans have such an arrogant attitude towards the rest of Australian sport, when in fact it is precisely fans of those sports that we need to get. For most basketball "purists" mentioning those two dreaded letters, A & F, gets them foaming at the mouth. Yet the fact remains that the NBL was moved to Summer, precisely to target those fans and reduce competition.

How is this relevant?
Well, when speaking to many of those AFL (& NRL) fans, the biggest criticism I hear of the NBL (and basketball) is "Too American."

Again, I know the "purists" will say that there are basketball fans who subscribe to NBA, but don't watch NBL, because whah whah whah. So ok, they might appreciate more NBA coverage, but that's not going to encourage NBL viewing.
The big question is whether non basketball fans are going to be won over by watching the NBA? And I tend to think not.

BUT, I think what would help is FTA coverage, in a decent timeslot, of Boomers games. (Does that happen? I don't know?)
And what we really need is the Basketball equivalent of the Bledisloe. Aussie fans would follow Curling if it meant beating the Kiwis.

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Anonymous  
Years ago

I'd like them to show a couple of games a week, but only show games involving Australias (Utah, 76ers, Bucks, Spurs, Celtics) and try make it about Aussie players and promo the NBL a lot during ad breaks.

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