Tuesday, July 25, 2006
When the NBA was king (part one)
Oye I know I haven't posted in eons and the 1 or 2 people that read this has probably gone away "sniffles". Anyways i'm gonna make a comeback as I have a lot of thoughts stored up in my mind lately.
When the NBA was king (part one)
There are many people of my age bracket that remember those weekends watching some of the greatest basketball in a generation. We had the pleasure of watching Magic, Bird, Jordan, Ewing, Stockton and Malone just to name a few. It was a time when the NBA was the hottest pro sports league in existence. It seemed that David Stern could do no wrong. Stern had the same kind of profile that Paul Tagliabue so rightfully deserved but in the end the end of a dynasty, the retirements of legendary players all within a few years and last but not least the over-reliance on the Greatest Player of All Time has put the NBA in a bad situation.
It's hard to believe that in the late 1970s the league was on the verge of collapse and the NHL had a higher profile in the U.S. The use and proliferation of cocaine and other drugs made the stars of the NBA into unmarketable, volatile nutcases for the most part. Of course there are exceptions like Dr. J but for the most part the NBA was a barren wasteland.
Just when the league was on the edge of oblivion two new stars joined the L and totally changed the league forever. The two men couldn't be more different. One was outgoing, gregarious, photogenic and could play the uptempo game that defined his generation. The other star was a country boy hick from the basketball mad state of Indiana. He was shy, awkward looking but had an amazing ability to shoot the lights out. They were Earvin "Magic" Johnson and Larry Bird.
They saved the league from oblivion and opened the door to what would be the most interesting and competitive 15 or so years in NBA history. One could argue it was the period from 1979-1998 that made the NBA THE talk of the sports world. The talent was far more spread out and the players were actually "gasp" REALLY talented. You had Ewing and Starks in NYC, Jordan, Pippen and later Rodman in Chi., Stockton, Malone, Hornacek in Utah, Bird, McHale, Parrish in Bos., Hakeem in Houston, Alex English in Denver, Magic, Kareem, Worthy, Scott etc etc in LAL.
Hell, even the lesser teams had some good talent during that time frame like Golden State having Chris Mullin, Tim Hardaway and a young Latrell Sprewell. The Clippers had Danny Manning for crying out loud!
The other thing that made the NBA so great was NBC and this is where I think a lot of the problems with the NBA come in today. Oh i'm sure we'd still complain about the lack of talent which i'll get into but David Stern has put his hand in the cookie jar one time too many. NBC was a very loyal broadcaster to the league and basically helped to make it as widespread as it is today. Remember when NBC lost the NFL rights? That was a huge blow right? Well yes but it wasn't so bad because NBC had the NBA which NBC had made into the crown jewel of their sports division.
My generation fondly remembers growing up hearing the John Tesh music and getting geeked up for NBA basketball. We'd marvel at the tough and at times chippy basketball you'd get from time to time. We all laughed at the silly arguments between Bill Walton and Snapper Jones and rolled our eyes at Peter Vecsey's attempts to throw out breaking news.....
and who can forget "YESSSSSS" from Marv Albert :)
In short, NBC made fans out of even casual sports fans. I can tell you this from experience. I distinctly remember in 1991 my whole family sitting around the TV watching the series clinching game between the Bulls and Lakers. It was a rite of passage every spring/summer to watch the playoffs on NBC. You didn't have to fret about whether the game was on this network or that. Even if NBC split the broadcast rights during the playoffs at least you knew it would be TNT and that's it. Sone nights these days you have to switch from TNT to ESPN then back to TNT. It's just far too confusing.
Finally, there's the thing we all remember most, the double and triple headers during the weekend, for that one brief moment in time the NBA almost had an NFL-like following because of those double/tripleheader games.
It's all gone now because Stern wanted the upfront money and he thought the exposure of ESPN would trump any kind of revenue loss. What he didn't bargain for was the casualness of the fanbase that the NBA had built up over the last decade and a half. Sure ESPN goes to a lot of homes but for the most part not everyone is a sports nut. You need to market the game to the outsiders because you're ALWAYS going to get the core audience. Stern went back-to-front with the cable only broadcast deal.
My next post will talk about the players, lack of talent today and the ill effects of the Bulls and to a lesser extent Laker dynasties.
It's hard to believe that in the late 1970s the league was on the verge of collapse and the NHL had a higher profile in the U.S. The use and proliferation of cocaine and other drugs made the stars of the NBA into unmarketable, volatile nutcases for the most part. Of course there are exceptions like Dr. J but for the most part the NBA was a barren wasteland.
Just when the league was on the edge of oblivion two new stars joined the L and totally changed the league forever. The two men couldn't be more different. One was outgoing, gregarious, photogenic and could play the uptempo game that defined his generation. The other star was a country boy hick from the basketball mad state of Indiana. He was shy, awkward looking but had an amazing ability to shoot the lights out. They were Earvin "Magic" Johnson and Larry Bird.
They saved the league from oblivion and opened the door to what would be the most interesting and competitive 15 or so years in NBA history. One could argue it was the period from 1979-1998 that made the NBA THE talk of the sports world. The talent was far more spread out and the players were actually "gasp" REALLY talented. You had Ewing and Starks in NYC, Jordan, Pippen and later Rodman in Chi., Stockton, Malone, Hornacek in Utah, Bird, McHale, Parrish in Bos., Hakeem in Houston, Alex English in Denver, Magic, Kareem, Worthy, Scott etc etc in LAL.
Hell, even the lesser teams had some good talent during that time frame like Golden State having Chris Mullin, Tim Hardaway and a young Latrell Sprewell. The Clippers had Danny Manning for crying out loud!
The other thing that made the NBA so great was NBC and this is where I think a lot of the problems with the NBA come in today. Oh i'm sure we'd still complain about the lack of talent which i'll get into but David Stern has put his hand in the cookie jar one time too many. NBC was a very loyal broadcaster to the league and basically helped to make it as widespread as it is today. Remember when NBC lost the NFL rights? That was a huge blow right? Well yes but it wasn't so bad because NBC had the NBA which NBC had made into the crown jewel of their sports division.
My generation fondly remembers growing up hearing the John Tesh music and getting geeked up for NBA basketball. We'd marvel at the tough and at times chippy basketball you'd get from time to time. We all laughed at the silly arguments between Bill Walton and Snapper Jones and rolled our eyes at Peter Vecsey's attempts to throw out breaking news.....
and who can forget "YESSSSSS" from Marv Albert :)
In short, NBC made fans out of even casual sports fans. I can tell you this from experience. I distinctly remember in 1991 my whole family sitting around the TV watching the series clinching game between the Bulls and Lakers. It was a rite of passage every spring/summer to watch the playoffs on NBC. You didn't have to fret about whether the game was on this network or that. Even if NBC split the broadcast rights during the playoffs at least you knew it would be TNT and that's it. Sone nights these days you have to switch from TNT to ESPN then back to TNT. It's just far too confusing.
Finally, there's the thing we all remember most, the double and triple headers during the weekend, for that one brief moment in time the NBA almost had an NFL-like following because of those double/tripleheader games.
It's all gone now because Stern wanted the upfront money and he thought the exposure of ESPN would trump any kind of revenue loss. What he didn't bargain for was the casualness of the fanbase that the NBA had built up over the last decade and a half. Sure ESPN goes to a lot of homes but for the most part not everyone is a sports nut. You need to market the game to the outsiders because you're ALWAYS going to get the core audience. Stern went back-to-front with the cable only broadcast deal.
My next post will talk about the players, lack of talent today and the ill effects of the Bulls and to a lesser extent Laker dynasties.
# posted by Chris Fung @ 1:55 AM 
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Anjaka as much as i'd like to I just don't think an art collection blog jibes with the things i'm interested in.
Sorry.
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