Stern heard talking about how the Lakers can drive ratings.

[LilMissSPURfect]

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/st...p-272093c.html

Final indignity

NBA ratings could spell doom

Tuning In

A record low number of viewers tuned in for Game 1 of the NBA Finals, where Gregg Popovich's Spurs beat the Pistons.
The ratings spin offered by ABC suits following Game 1 of the NBA Finals shows they don't have much faith in David Stern's product.

Thursday's Pistons-Spurs matchup recorded a 7.2 national rating, the second-lowest rated Game 1 ever for an NBA Finals in prime time, down 27% from a 9.8 for Game 1 of Pistons-Lakers last year. Pistons-Spurs - a live championship sports event - could not even beat CBS' "CSI" rerun, which won the night.

Prior to the release of the national rating for Game 1, and in a jive attempt to justify reality, ABC officials issued a statement reporting the 8.8 "overnight" rating (which measures the 55 largest TV markets in the U.S.) for Pistons-Spurs, but highlighted the fact that the rating was "9% higher than the last non-Lakers Finals Game 1" (2003 Nets-Spurs, 8.1 rating).

This just in: According to ABC brass, the Lakers, as a TV property, are a separate en y floating above the rest of the NBA. Maybe that's why ABC hyped its Thursday pregame interview with Phil Jackson more than they hyped Game 1 itself.




And yet, we are happy to report despite the absence of the Lakers, and after a momentum-building (ha ha) three-day hiatus, ABC actually will air Game 2 of Pistons-Spurs tonight.

ABC's reaction to Game 1 ratings should embarrass the entire league. What good is the overall NBA product to ABC if all the honchos there do is hope the Lakers make it to the Finals? Of course, often Stern too has been heard talking about how the Lakers can drive ratings. So maybe he applauds ABC's propaganda.

There is no need to recount how Stern's decision to get the most money for his owners, in return for making the NBA a basically all-cable league, has hurt the product. There is no need to detail how the lack of a consistent "free" TV platform has hampered the NBA's overall promotion and ratings.

The combined promotional forces of TNT and ESPN, the alleged "Worldwide Leader in Sports," had absolutely no impact on casual fans, a necessity when it comes to driving ratings for major sports events. By the end of the current TV deal, the NBA is going to be devalued as a TV product. While the commish might have done right by the owners in the last TV negotiation, he could get whacked in the back end of this deal.

For if this ratings slide - which shows a rapidly diminishing interest in the NBA - continues, are Stern's good friends at Disney-owned ESPN/ABC and TNT going to want to pay millions more for NBA TV rights? Will any other network enter the bidding to help jack up the price? No and no.

Still, if ABC had aired both conference finals, with games every other night, and promoted the heck out of the NBA playoffs on its entertainment shows, maybe casual fans would have some interest in Pistons-Spurs.

And the suits at ABC would not need to use the Lakers as an excuse.


I hate to keep harping on the ratings....but ITS not SPURS AND DETROIT'S FAULT!!!


Maybe if ABC/ESPN showed interest in the other 28 teams [LA & NY/SHAQ need not apply] during the season maybe the TYPICAL viewers would too.!!!!!!!!

[constantstate]

exactly... and i think the spurs should try to generate more interest in themselves as well... its the next step for the franchise thats seen david/aj personality turn to a duncan/parker personality... and getting second and third scorers (allstars) like manu that they can actually market if they want to... overseas and nationally.

we're in the finals 2 out of the 3 last years... won 2 of the last 6... but instead of our black and silver jerseys going through the roof... other teams add black to their uni's and merch. (screw that)

[Vashner]

WTF is wrong with these people?

Media too ...

If only 3-4 big city teams won over and over what kind of sport league would it be?
This is Basketball not WWF wrestling...

Most media... and even people like Jim Rome still pick spurs to win. It's only the little LA / NYC stuck up's that want Shaq Steel etc...

LA would not even be in USA if it was not for our little city so they should stfu they would be Mexico right now...

[whottt]

If it makes you guys feel any better...

On WOAI they said game 2 drew the largest international audience ever for an NBA game...110 million people.(For Chump...50 million chinese, maybe they remember Mengke).

It seems the rest of the world wants to watch the Spurs play...it's only America that's got a problem with it...no wonder our Olympic team got slapped...because the team they picked was one designed to please an American audience...and it was an illconcieved team built mainly around a bunch of low PCT shooting ball hogs and only one legit bigman.

If the casual fan doesn't enjoy watching Manu play than there is just something wrong with them.

[whottt]

Also, the cable ratings are at record highs...ABC is just stupid.

[1Parker1]

ABC needs better commentators and not 100 year old men. Maybe then, people will tune it. They also need better pre-game shows then Alanis Morrsett...

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

The league's biggest problem is it latches on to guys who have no prayer of winning jack and don't market the teams that are obviously going to be there at the end of the year.

If the league started saying it's cool to watch the Spurs, people would follow. The sports reporters, and the majority of NBA fans, they're nothing but sheep. Tell them where to go, they'll follow.

[Mark in Austin]

It would also help if ABC found somebody with a personality to call the game. Give me Marv Albert, Doug Collins, and Steve Kerr over Al "phoning it in" Michaels any day.

[constantstate]

ABC needs better commentators and not 100 year old men. Maybe then, people will tune it. They also need better pre-game shows then Alanis Morrsett...

free agency for barkley, ej, magic (and yeah i guess kenny) - also for kevin "right BE-tween the eyes" harlan

[LilMissSPURfect]

and the crowds chants>.......

"TNT....TNT.......TNT.......TNT........TNT........ ..TNT.........TNT.............TNT"

[Spurs R Us]

Al Michaels has been horrible. I especially loved it when he explained that after a team commits 5 fouls in a quarter the other team gets to shoot free throws for the rest of the period. Duhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!! I think the majority of the people watching the game know this.

[LilMissSPURfect]

maybe he thought his mic was off and was telling hubie [old man disease}