NBA Lessons For The NHL

[norrisnick]

I remember the good ol' days when threads about "why is the NHL run by an NBA exec?" were all the rage...

 

[missionAvs]

Wut?

I'm assuming he meant that stars are tough sobs on painkillers.

 

[Roomtemperature]

Good video.
I agree with most of it but I think they left out the elephant in the room.
If I mention it I think the moderators will delete this post.
So let me say that the NBA is having the same issues that Hollywood is having today.
You can't give the middle finger to half of your fans and then wonder why they stop watching?

And what is that and why is that a middle finger to those people?

Funny enough, I think the NBA has suffered the most from the move to analytics.

What analytics? Anyone who played NBA Jam in the 90s could tell you its either dunks or 3pts

 

[NVious]

I think the on ice product is fantastic, but the ads are out of hand, it's getting to the unwatchable territory, you get a break every 5 minutes, then in game board ads, then in game ads and the gambling trash that is everywhere, but obviously things are only gonna get worse from here.

 

[qc14]

I think a lot of the "product" issues with the NBA -- lack of physicality and effort in the regular season, 3 point spam, foul-baiting, etc. -- are actually not really a problem in the NHL at all. If anything, the amount of creativity, scoring, skill in the league is the highest it's ever been.

As with everything these days the two main reasons are streaming and the NFL. Anything else (storytelling, rivalries, too many/too few games, lack of physicality, too much physicality, marketing, etc.) might impact things sure but are for the most part just people projecting what they want to see happen.

Unfortunately, streaming and the NFL aren't going away. Fortunately for hockey, the NHL is and has always been much less reliant on TV revenue than the NBA

 

[JPT]

And what is that and why is that a middle finger to those people?


What analytics? Anyone who played NBA Jam in the 90s could tell you its either dunks or 3pts

I'd imagine it is similar to the "middle finger" given to those people by the 1950 NBA draft, but that's just a guess.

 

[Roomtemperature]

I think a lot of the "product" issues with the NBA -- lack of physicality and effort in the regular season, 3 point spam, foul-baiting, etc. -- are actually not really a problem in the NHL at all. If anything, the amount of creativity, scoring, skill in the league is the highest it's ever been.

As with everything these days the two main reasons are streaming and the NFL. Anything else (storytelling, rivalries, too many/too few games, lack of physicality, too much physicality, marketing, etc.) might impact things sure but are for the most part just people projecting what they want to see happen.

Unfortunately, streaming and the NFL aren't going away. Fortunately for hockey, the NHL is and has always been much less reliant on TV revenue than the NBA

The one issue the NHL has that the NBA has is... there are too many games to make a large portion of the season feel important. Especially with how many make the playoffs. So there are gonna be times in the season where the number 1 seed feels like they are just playing games to get them done. And honestly how you can change that is impossible unless you give seeding a bigger advantage then home ice. Like having to get one less win in a series or a goal each game or something equivalent

 

[GeeoffBrown]

I think a lot of the "product" issues with the NBA -- lack of physicality and effort in the regular season, 3 point spam, foul-baiting, etc. -- are actually not really a problem in the NHL at all. If anything, the amount of creativity, scoring, skill in the league is the highest it's ever been.

As with everything these days the two main reasons are streaming and the NFL. Anything else (storytelling, rivalries, too many/too few games, lack of physicality, too much physicality, marketing, etc.) might impact things sure but are for the most part just people projecting what they want to see happen.

Unfortunately, streaming and the NFL aren't going away. Fortunately for hockey, the NHL is and has always been much less reliant on TV revenue than the NBA

if anything, cable is going away and everything will be streaming, unless something better than streaming comes around

 

[Roomtemperature]

I'd imagine it is similar to the "middle finger" given to those people by the 1950 NBA draft, but that's just a guess.

Yeah its befuddling.

 

[qc14]

The one issue the NHL has that the NBA has is... there are too many games to make a large portion of the season feel important. Especially with how many make the playoffs. So there are gonna be times in the season where the number 1 seed feels like they are just playing games to get them done. And honestly how you can change that is impossible unless you give seeding a bigger advantage then home ice. Like having to get one less win in a series or a goal each game or something equivalent

Even if fewer games would increase ratings per game (which I'm not sure it is!) what owners really care about for all of these metrics (streams, viewers, revenue, tickets sold, etc.) is total volume and I'm not sure the decrease in games would make up for the increase in the rate per game. There's a reason the NFL pushed so hard to get a 17th game!

 

[Roomtemperature]

Even if fewer games would increase ratings per game (which I'm not sure it is!) what owners really care about for all of these metrics (streams, viewers, revenue, tickets sold, etc.) is total volume and I'm not sure the decrease in games would make up for the increase in the rate per game. There's a reason the NFL pushed so hard to get a 17th game!

I know and the NBA has it worse cause if you are mid and not rising in the NBA you might as well have no hope but like baseball I like the ability to go to a game even if its a bad team and not pay an arm and a leg in the middle of the season.

 

[TheBeerNerd]

I feel like just last year NBA was crushing it in ratings. Perhaps, it's because they had a good partner before in Warner Bros Discovery or perhaps because they moved more games to Amazon Prime

Basically, the NBA got an absurd amount of money to move the games off of TBS/TNT, where they were doing well in TV ratings. I'm sure the NHL would love to replicate this.

It's not that the NBA got an absurd amount of money to leave TNT, it's that the dipshit in charge of WBD was never all that interested in reupping their contract.

 

[Tie Domi Esquire]

The league is already run by NBA people and have done enough to try and shoehorn hockey into a basketball business model.

 

[Roomtemperature]

The league is already run by NBA people and have done enough to try and shoehorn hockey into a basketball business model.

So what model should the NHL do to maximize revenues?

 

[TGWL]

And what is that and why is that a middle finger to those people?


What analytics? Anyone who played NBA Jam in the 90s could tell you its either dunks or 3pts

If you didn't master the 3 pointer with players like Reggie Miller, you lost.

 

[The Gr8 Dane]

Not even close , try again

 

[Calderon]

Luckily the NHL doesn't have player empowerment and what I'd claim is wage theft as young and healthy men who are making 40-50 million per year sit out games, barely train and stay in shape, avoid tough match-ups, don't feel like winning is as important as buying supercars and treat coming to the games as catwalks. Players like Zion, Simmons, Embiid are cancerous to the sport.

From that angle I guess the LTIR gimmickry is worst the NHL offers and even that is team driven instead of player.

In the NHL the OT format has grown pretty stale and would need some kind of overhaul. As for officiating, I strongly prefer to see skill on the ice be largely uninhibited: no cheap shots, no deliberate injuring of players etc., play hard but clean. I don't think I have as clear a stance on what I think about that in the NBA. I suppose some more physicality would be a welcome change.

As a spectator sport the NBA is definitely in the decline. Glad they eliminated the bulk of what James Harden was doing with the free throw baiting. The three point galore is still a big issue that needs addressing, maybe put a limit on the number of attempts per quarter or something like that -- moving the line might be too big an action as it interferes with the game's history too much. As would raising the rim.

That NBA salaries have grown to stratospheric proportions is a problem that's difficult to fix. They do earn a substantial portion of the money that networks are willing to pay for the rights, it'd probably be unfair if way more than half went to the owners. But something needs to be done imo. Having said that, obviously the inflation has been big too: per one inflation calculator the cumulative inflation from 2004 (LeBron's rookie year) to 2025 is 66.1 %. I'm sailing the high seas, too, and don't really bother watching any regular season games.

 

[Gregor Samsa]

Good video.
I agree with most of it but I think they left out the elephant in the room.
If I mention it I think the moderators will delete this post.
So let me say that the NBA is having the same issues that Hollywood is having today.
You can't give the middle finger to half of your fans and then wonder why they stop watching?

As for the NHL, for the most part they did not do this so it is not as much as an issue.
Reducing physicality in hockey is keeping players healthier but it is taking the "hate and rivalry" out of the game.

I miss the battle/war of AB in the 80/90s.
I miss the Tor/Bos hatred.
MTL/Que hate was awesome to watch in the 80's and 90's
Bos/Mtl in the 70's.
Philly against anyone they were playing in the 80s
These were not PO series or regular season games, theses were declarations of war.
The NHL no longer has this.

Hollywood sure has a lot of egg on its face in recent times. Like we’re supposed to believe that a group that has applauded and honored people like Polanski and Kirk Douglas for years is all of a sudden going to do an about-face? It just reeks of hypocrisy and being full of shit with shameless pandering

 

[JPT]

I never realized that, after leaving Facebook, the thing I'd be missing the most in my life was reading posts from old guys whining about Hollywood.

 

[AtlantaHockeyFanatic]

Good video.
I agree with most of it but I think they left out the elephant in the room.
If I mention it I think the moderators will delete this post.
So let me say that the NBA is having the same issues that Hollywood is having today.
You can't give the middle finger to half of your fans and then wonder why they stop watching?

Explain


How is calling out injustice giving the middle finger to fans? Those guys have the platform to get things done.

 

[MikeyMike01]

There's so many entertainment options nowadays.

The NHL, MLB and NBA all play a ton of games. It waters down the product. Too many meaningless games.

The NFL only plays 17 games and the stakes always feel higher because of it.

The NFL also dedicates a huge chunk of their season to divisional games. The rivalries are heated.

NHL rivalries are completely dead because you play them four times a year. 32 games against cross conference opponents… boring, unappealing, terrible games with goofy start times to boot.

 

[johnjm22]

The NFL also dedicates a huge chunk of their season to divisional games. The rivalries are heated.

NHL rivalries are completely dead because you play them four times a year. 32 games against cross conference opponents… boring, unappealing, terrible games with goofy start times to boot.

The NHL tried emphasizing divisional games. Everybody hated it. Playing the same teams over and over again. That's why they went away from it.

It might be a "huge chunk" in the NFL, but it's still only two games. 1 home. 1 away.

 

[FDBluth]

NBA is a solved game, basically. It all comes down to the breakthrough of the Warriors. Baseball is similar that way.

Hockey is so entropy driven, how you manage the luck you're dealt is a huge part of greatness. I do think it will have its robotic moment but not anytime soon.

But the reality of kids and media these days is that real life sports aren't that interesting. Video games / immersive experiences will be king.

The puck ain't round though, which will always make things interesting.

 

[MikeyMike01]

The NHL tried emphasizing divisional games. Everybody hated it. Playing the same teams over and over again. That's why they went away from it.

It might be a "huge chunk" in the NFL, but it's still only two games. 1 home. 1 away.

I don’t know who ‘everyone’ is, but the only regular season I’ve fully enjoyed in eons is the covid one with exclusively division games.

There’s nothing more excruciating than sitting through another Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, Los Angeles, San Jose, Anaheim; road trip. I end up on my phone for half of those games, desperately trying to care who wins.

There should be 8 games against each divisional opponent.

 

[T REX]

Well said.
There are consequences when you tell half your fan base to take a hike because you do not like their politics. The entertainment and sports industries have seem to have forgotten they thrive as a escape for average people. Once you put politics into your product you WILL alienate at lease half of your fan base and remove the most important reason why people watch and care. I'll never go to a movie theater again. I will never watch an NBA game again. I simply do not care anymore. Apathy is the greatest danger to professional sports today. The NHL has not pissed me off yet so I remain a fan but they better learn the lessons that the NBA and NFL are now learning.

The NFL totally alienated half their fanbase and they all came back.

And more. So, if your product is good enough...that proves to me it won't matter.