Throwaway line from the gamethread is thread-worthy on its own:
Mark Cuban, to no surprise, is the most outspoken on the subject. He has expounded on NBA-vs-NFL many times before, on many different subjects: the NFL's greed and expansion to thursdays, the long-term prospects with respect to concussions and safety, the decline in youth participation, and the marketability of the NBA's stars. He makes good points, though obviously from an extremely self-interested point of view. Fortune did an analysis of this, but it's now paywalled.
First, the stats:
- The NFL made $16.9B in 2019, of which ~$9.1B was TV revenue. Their major TV rights deals all end in 2022, with a 50%+ increase anticipated. The league has stated they want to get to $25B in annual revenue.
- MLB made $10.7B in 2019, of which only $2.1B was from TV (including all the RSNs). Their national TV deals are up after 2021 and expected to bring substantial hikes.
- NBA made $8.0B in 2019, of which $2.6B was from TV - and last year was the first time it was closer in top line ($8.0) to MLB than it was to the NHL ($5.1B). Its revenue is still growing at a faster rate than MLB.
But what of it, Port Cellar Dwellers? Could that happen in 10-20 years?
Basketball, as a sport, has an advantage the other 3 big leagues don't (and which it shares with soccer): Just about anybody can find a recreational game, just about anywhere. You can go down to a park or playground and find a pickup game of either, kids and adults both. Whereas you have to be a part of organized, pricey rec teams to play baseball past childhood, and likewise hockey; other than flag football, nobody plays full-contact gridiron football as a casual thing. That's helped basketball become the second most widely-played sport worldwide, which means Pro Basketball writ large will probably continue growing strongly even while the NFL stagnates due to its US-centricity and declining individual participation. But the question is, how can the NBA continue to get an outsized share of that growth, to the point where their popularity (and the TV contracts to show it) zoom past other leagues?
Their shot at that is largely thanks to David Stern seeding the game globally decades ago, while the NFL still has yet to really commit to that. Stern gets crap for a few things, but he largely had the golden touch for 30 years, including who he anointed as his successor.Adam Silver is the best commissioner in sports right now. The NBA may end up overtaking the NFL in a few years.
Mark Cuban, to no surprise, is the most outspoken on the subject. He has expounded on NBA-vs-NFL many times before, on many different subjects: the NFL's greed and expansion to thursdays, the long-term prospects with respect to concussions and safety, the decline in youth participation, and the marketability of the NBA's stars. He makes good points, though obviously from an extremely self-interested point of view. Fortune did an analysis of this, but it's now paywalled.
First, the stats:
- The NFL made $16.9B in 2019, of which ~$9.1B was TV revenue. Their major TV rights deals all end in 2022, with a 50%+ increase anticipated. The league has stated they want to get to $25B in annual revenue.
- MLB made $10.7B in 2019, of which only $2.1B was from TV (including all the RSNs). Their national TV deals are up after 2021 and expected to bring substantial hikes.
- NBA made $8.0B in 2019, of which $2.6B was from TV - and last year was the first time it was closer in top line ($8.0) to MLB than it was to the NHL ($5.1B). Its revenue is still growing at a faster rate than MLB.
But what of it, Port Cellar Dwellers? Could that happen in 10-20 years?
In my view, for the NBA to really accelerate its ascent, a few things need to happen:
1) Firstly, they need to consider expanding, not just 1-2 teams but aggressively, to leverage the sport's advantages. The cost to establish a new NBA team is pretty low relative to other major sports, with fewer players to retain, many more arena options (until you build your own), and a league office that isn't a disaster and has the capacity to help you with various startup things. The talent pool is clearly sufficient to sustain the product, which just can't be said for NFL QBs or MLB relief pitching. More importantly, with the way the salary cap works, smaller-market teams have more of a shot than they do in MLB, so the minimum efficient scale is smaller. Here are the biggest TV markets (by Nielsen DMA rank) that the NBA is not yet in:
#12 Tampa - St Pete (perhaps Orlando claims territorial rights?)
#23 St Louis (recently abandoned by the NFL, soon to be added-to by MLS)
#24 Pittsburgh, #26 Baltimore, #27 Raleigh-Durham, #28 Nashville, #29 San Diego
...not to mention Vancouver and its 2.8M metro-area population.
There's a few that have ZERO Big 4 sports-league presence:
- #33 Hartford
- #36 West Palm Beach
- #40 Austin (getting MLS in a year or two)
- To that, add that #27 Raleigh-Durham and #34 Columbus OH have only the NHL at present
(they are, however, in some smaller ones: #35 Milwaukee, #43 Oklahoma City, #50 New Orleans, and #51 Memphis - and the latter three of those are by way of relocations)
2) Continue helping the game grow globally, remain a collection of global all-stars, and thereby maintain the NBA's preeminence in the minds of sports fans around the world. Do this by expanding preseason scrimmages against foreign teams, maybe including some world teams in the in-season tournament, maybe a summer Club World Cup in an Olympics/FIBA off-year, where the NBA teams can't send any of their starters (or maybe just one, for marketing). They're doing a lot right by having players give clinics and fund courts around the world, and of course scouting for talent. There's always more room to give a boost to a decently-run foreign league by lending them some legitimacy (Japan comes to mind). This is partly an investment in future license-revenue growth, but also a hedge against being able to seize a greater share of the viewership pie domestically, which might be close to tapped-out as far as demographics go.
3) It'd really help if basketball was just as good a viewing experience with stadium crowds of 30,000 as opposed to the current 18-20k capacities that nearly all NBA teams have. Yes, you don't want to over-build for your market, and you can always raise ticket prices if you start to sell out, but revenue maximization improves when you can offer more tiered prices to a larger market. The USA team played Australia in a pre-world-cup tune-up in what was basically a football stadium, capacity 55,000, and it was way too NFL-like: you couldn't really follow the subtle movements, it lacked the intimacy that makes an in-person NBA game so vivid an experience. I'm willing to bet you can do 30k stadiums in the next wave of stadium construction and still maintain that intimacy.
4) On the flip side, China is a huge risk factor: The league generates at least $500M / yr from China, perhaps as much as double that. And they have, as we here all well know, largely sold their souls to the CCP as far as refraining from commenting on social issues there. But then again, the NBA is the #1 sports league in China, ahead of even the Premier League, so to a certain extent they may have leverage they have yet to exercise, both financially and socially. Perhaps there's room for Silver to be less of a hypocrite on the subject, or perhaps not, but it's something of a skeleton in the league's closet.
...and probably 5) some continued stumbling by the NFL (particularly safety / concussions) and MLB (pace-of-play).
1) Firstly, they need to consider expanding, not just 1-2 teams but aggressively, to leverage the sport's advantages. The cost to establish a new NBA team is pretty low relative to other major sports, with fewer players to retain, many more arena options (until you build your own), and a league office that isn't a disaster and has the capacity to help you with various startup things. The talent pool is clearly sufficient to sustain the product, which just can't be said for NFL QBs or MLB relief pitching. More importantly, with the way the salary cap works, smaller-market teams have more of a shot than they do in MLB, so the minimum efficient scale is smaller. Here are the biggest TV markets (by Nielsen DMA rank) that the NBA is not yet in:
#12 Tampa - St Pete (perhaps Orlando claims territorial rights?)
#23 St Louis (recently abandoned by the NFL, soon to be added-to by MLS)
#24 Pittsburgh, #26 Baltimore, #27 Raleigh-Durham, #28 Nashville, #29 San Diego
...not to mention Vancouver and its 2.8M metro-area population.
There's a few that have ZERO Big 4 sports-league presence:
- #33 Hartford
- #36 West Palm Beach
- #40 Austin (getting MLS in a year or two)
- To that, add that #27 Raleigh-Durham and #34 Columbus OH have only the NHL at present
(they are, however, in some smaller ones: #35 Milwaukee, #43 Oklahoma City, #50 New Orleans, and #51 Memphis - and the latter three of those are by way of relocations)
2) Continue helping the game grow globally, remain a collection of global all-stars, and thereby maintain the NBA's preeminence in the minds of sports fans around the world. Do this by expanding preseason scrimmages against foreign teams, maybe including some world teams in the in-season tournament, maybe a summer Club World Cup in an Olympics/FIBA off-year, where the NBA teams can't send any of their starters (or maybe just one, for marketing). They're doing a lot right by having players give clinics and fund courts around the world, and of course scouting for talent. There's always more room to give a boost to a decently-run foreign league by lending them some legitimacy (Japan comes to mind). This is partly an investment in future license-revenue growth, but also a hedge against being able to seize a greater share of the viewership pie domestically, which might be close to tapped-out as far as demographics go.
3) It'd really help if basketball was just as good a viewing experience with stadium crowds of 30,000 as opposed to the current 18-20k capacities that nearly all NBA teams have. Yes, you don't want to over-build for your market, and you can always raise ticket prices if you start to sell out, but revenue maximization improves when you can offer more tiered prices to a larger market. The USA team played Australia in a pre-world-cup tune-up in what was basically a football stadium, capacity 55,000, and it was way too NFL-like: you couldn't really follow the subtle movements, it lacked the intimacy that makes an in-person NBA game so vivid an experience. I'm willing to bet you can do 30k stadiums in the next wave of stadium construction and still maintain that intimacy.
4) On the flip side, China is a huge risk factor: The league generates at least $500M / yr from China, perhaps as much as double that. And they have, as we here all well know, largely sold their souls to the CCP as far as refraining from commenting on social issues there. But then again, the NBA is the #1 sports league in China, ahead of even the Premier League, so to a certain extent they may have leverage they have yet to exercise, both financially and socially. Perhaps there's room for Silver to be less of a hypocrite on the subject, or perhaps not, but it's something of a skeleton in the league's closet.
...and probably 5) some continued stumbling by the NFL (particularly safety / concussions) and MLB (pace-of-play).
Basketball, as a sport, has an advantage the other 3 big leagues don't (and which it shares with soccer): Just about anybody can find a recreational game, just about anywhere. You can go down to a park or playground and find a pickup game of either, kids and adults both. Whereas you have to be a part of organized, pricey rec teams to play baseball past childhood, and likewise hockey; other than flag football, nobody plays full-contact gridiron football as a casual thing. That's helped basketball become the second most widely-played sport worldwide, which means Pro Basketball writ large will probably continue growing strongly even while the NFL stagnates due to its US-centricity and declining individual participation. But the question is, how can the NBA continue to get an outsized share of that growth, to the point where their popularity (and the TV contracts to show it) zoom past other leagues?