What the NBA Can Learn from Formula 1

I would love an equivalent of Drive to Survive for the NBA. If the league was smart, they would pay for a 10-part yearly series and put it on YouTube for free.

Introduce the major players and recap last season. Show me the drama- who did unexpectedly well and who choked in the playoffs. Explain why Nicola Jokic won a second MVP and why that’s cool. Show me behind-the-scenes footage of players.

Basically, they should make it as easy as possible to go from zero to full fan. You should be able to jump into a new season and know what’s going on.

This was a good read. I haven’t cared much about the NBA since the Jordan Bulls era, so I doubt that I’m really representative of the market. I’ve even passed up free tickets because I care so little. But NCAA basketball - now that’s a different story! I buy tickets and go to games.

I have two observations. A few years ago, I took my son to a Formula 1 event that was not related to a race, it was just some thing that was traveling city to city around the US. They had tents with cars and gear and people to explain things, and then they closed off a boulevard and had F1 cars of different eras driving up and down at moderate speed (maybe 100 mph max?). But the cars had to do U-turns at both ends, and only the 1980s car could actually do it. The rest had to rev, do a couple donuts, and then come out of the smoke at 180 degrees to where they came in. But half the time the driver would stall the car, a tow truck had to come get them, and they’d send out another car while getting the other one restarted. It was all in good fun, and everyone had a super noisy fun time.

Second, the new MLS soccer deal with Apple looks really interesting. As far as I can tell it is available worldwide, and you don’t need to be an AppleTV subscriber (but you get a $20 discount if you are). People around the world aren’t really going to care about the MLS, but because of the time zones the live matches are going to be on at times where there isn’t much else in the way of live soccer. It could end up getting a lot of subscribers just for that.

No one cares about the All-Star game because it is, in the words of Jaylen Brown, "it's a glorified layup line". It's not meant to be competitive, the whole schedule of the weekend doesn't lend itself to it being competitive and if anyone did take it very seriously and get injured (imagine if Lebron's finger broke when it got stuck on the rim) people would be bitching about "why the hell would you play that hard for a game that doesn't matter when the finals stretch is coming up??" and they'd be right. I dunno what they need to do, but one idea might be to offer serious financial incentives, e.g. a million dollar reward for the dunk contest and something similar for MVP of the All-Star game.

the all star game does have financial incentives. 25k to losing players, 100k to winners. Apparently 75k isn't enough to convince the players to try. I think it makes sense when considering how much they have to lose with the playoffs coming up.

I think this is where the midseason tournament idea can come in. 75k might be nothing to the max contract guys in the all star game, but half the players on every team are on minimum deals making around a million. The 75k would be big for those guys and I think the peer pressure from them could be enough to get the stars to really go out there and give it their all.

As far as the all star game goes, I'm not sure fixing it is possible or even that necessary. What's wrong with it just being a harlem globetrotters game? Sure the ratings won't be great, but maybe that's just something the league has to accept.