The Real Problem With the NBA That No One is Talking About

[@amandla007]

The goofy narrative where NBA players from back in the day wouldn't cut it today has to stop. They're still tall, skilled guys. They would just train for the way the game is played today. Please stap it

[@danielplainview2360]

No one wants to see a 3 point shooting contest in every game. Boring.

[@euro51116]

IMO the problem is the NBA has gotten too greedy with broadcasting. There are cities where its cheaper to get league pass than it is to watch their own team on TV. Don't even get me started on the multiple streaming packages needed to watch national games. The interest is there and growing, but actual NBA basketball has never been less accessible. If the NBA counted streameast numbers they'd see their peaking in viewers if anything

[@I_Ace]

U hit the nail on the head. I have KZbin TV. I live in Chicago. I was able to watch the bulls and nearby teams like Bucks and 76ers daily. But now it wont even let me watch the bulls(the area where im from) and it barely lets me watch any games now. Some days it wont even let me watch basketball at all even when games are gone. So stupid. Havent watched one Bulls game this year and bars are having trouble with it too. I might get leagur pass buy damn I dont want to drop more money.

[@I_Ace]

Last year I could watch games fine. Now I barely can see games. They do throw in good games here and there but its way worse than last year

[@Klevergamer]

Preeeeeeach

[@reggiebanksrb10]

They’re*

[@MrRoaringRiot]

Why NBA is dying: - 3 point contest/Brickfest/Airball Fest - Entitled players - Dramatic players - Lazy defenses - Terrible calls / Refs - Teams getting constantly blownout every game - Terrible Media And the list goes on...

[@dalton7726]

I kinda agree but I also don’t hear this discourse with other sports. Ratings aren’t down in other sports. The playstyle and the lack of care teams put into the regular season matters. The fact that there’s no dynasties also kills casual interest. Jokic isn’t a good face of the league because he’s zero drama or flash. It’ll rebalance but the 2020s will be looked at as a dark age for the NBA like the 70s were.

[@werideatdusk]

The stratification of our culture means ratings across the board are down - cable news, movie tickets, etc. People are too busy scrolling on social media or KZbin to watch 82 regular season games.

[@And.One.Hoops1]

Yep, exactly

[@martymcintosh5026]

I agree, although I'll watch the NBA if my team is winning

[@bmla88]

2:34 “Nostalgia - its delicate, but potent. In Greek nostalgia literally means ‘the pain from an old wound.’ It’s a twinge in your heart far more powerful than memory alone.” - Don Draper

[@elementkx]

Don't care about stats. Its the eye test. Stats is what caused load management and three point barrage. Give us some real players that care about the game, Anthony Edwards.

[@bamidelakin-np2ub]

Im sorry, but this was brought about like Steph Curry. The success of the Warriors brought this about, and Iman Shumpert said it best, "The problem isnt that you shoot alot of 3pts, its the fact you think you're Curry."

[@tirosc]

Yes and no. Steph and the Warriors brought in the era of small ball and every team since then has been trying to perfectly execute what the Warriors did. The problem isn't about just about the 3s. What's the fun in watching basketball if everyone is just running small ball lineup and fumbling the ball or bricking 3s? At its best, small ball is amazing as the Warriors showed in the 2010s. At its worst, it's close to unwatchable. Blaming the Warriors and Steph for this is like blaming someone else for being better than you at work. There's always deeper problems than that. Think critically.

[@bamidelakin-np2ub]

​@@tirosc You're completely right, Golden State was an amazing team because of chemistry, ball movement pacing and perimeter defense. Teams only replicated the shooting

[@PeterWilson-c3u]

@@bamidelakin-np2ub The three point shooting influx is a factor, but the NBA is still doing very well. NBA is currently king of social media. The issue is getting fans in front of televisions. It's no longer the 80s/90s. Fans have more than 8 channels

[@Davivd2]

Not really. That takes responsibility away from the other teams and their management. The Warriors did a few things differently that lead to their success and 3 point shooting, IMO, was the least significant aspect of their success. They ran the Princeton offense, which was something that got Mike Brown fired for when he tried it years earlier in LA and had the media bashing him for trying it. Now off ball movement is the new meta of the league, and in that regard the game is better for it. The Warriors also put together lineups with versatile defenders who could switch on defense for every position in the game. As much as everyone wants to focus on their 3 point shooting, the Warriors were a top 5 defensive team in the NBA for every one of their finals appearances. That's something that has been true of nearly every team to win the title over the last 40 years. The Warriors have the 2 best shooters in NBA history on their team. Why wouldn't they utilize that? The problem is that for all of the good things, that can be replicated without too much trouble, the other teams tried to copy the volume 3 point shooting. Which only works because.....they had the 2 best shooters in the history of the game. That's just bad management. When you couple that along with the universal trend of falling head over heels for metrics, then you wind up with a bad product. Why metrics are bad: Some are good. Others are terrible, and without the ability to apply proper context to the metric, they can be misleading. "The mid range shot is the worst shot in basketball". No. A rushed shot is the worst in basketball. The interpretation of the metric is that you should always just jack up a 3 if you have any amount of space. In reality, if you have to rush that shot, it's got a very low chance of going in. If you pump fake, get the defender to jump by you and take one dribble inside the line, shoot in rhythm, are wide open with plenty of time, the mid range shot is a MUCH better shot than the 3. Truthfully, no metric can predict a good shot or a bad shot. The best shot in the game of basketball has always, and will always be, the most wide open shot with the most amount of time to shoot it. Defensive win shares is a terrible stat. Bad defenders playing on good defensive teams lead the league in defensive win shares. Last year KAT was 9th in the league in defensive win shares. Damien Lilllard was in the top 30. Everyone knows they are bad defensive players. Sorry but blaming Steph and the Warriors for this mess is a bad take. Teams have to take responsibility for adopting metrics without understanding what to listen to and what to filter out, and chasing a trend that shouldn't be chased. It's great that players are focusing more on shooting. Players should always shoot open 3's if they have the time and are not rushing a shot. But trying to force 3 point shots is bad for the league and the Warriors and Steph Curry are not the coach's responsible for the 29 other teams poor decision making.

[@cheap272]

ratings have been horrible and the teams that have been taking 10 billion 3s are usually good so there is no on-court reason to stop, i hope ratings keep going down and the league gets put in a tough spot so the players will actually care about the game and putting a good product out there instead of just getting contracts

[@Davivd2]

The NBA has gone all in with appealing to casual fans and trying to push a narrative of excitement. When I was a kid, learning the game, the broadcasters like Stu Lantz, Doug Collins, and Hubbie Brown would break down calls and plays and explain what was happening. This took me from being an uneducated casual fan, to someone who truly loved the game because I could understand it. Now the NBA lets people travel, let's players commit offensive fouls every game, and even when the terrible officiating gets completely exposed on replay review, just keeps letting it happen. Refs never get suspended or fired. It's extremely rare when a bad call even gets publicly acknowledged. IMO the NBA has 2 big problems. The first being that the game has terrible, and I mean worst in all of professional sports terrible officiating. WWE referee's have a better reputation for officiating than NBA refs. The second being educating it's casual fan base into knowledgeable fans. It's OK to appeal to casuals. Highlights and short form content will always be able to attract casual fans. But if the NBA wants to retain those fans, it needs to educate them about the game. It needs to stop insulting the intelligence of the viewer and address the officiating. If you have never seen a basketball game in your life, you watch a game, the ref makes a bad call on someone who is 3 feet away from the person who they committed a "foul" against, and there is a replay, where anyone who can rub two brain cells together can see that the defender never touched the guy, and somehow the replay doesn't overturn the bad call, that's going to turn people away. Casual fans come and go, they have a short attention span and really only care about highlights. Trying to turn the game into a 2 and a half hour highlight reel isn't the answer. If every play is a highlight, then nothing is a highlight. The NBA needs to teach it's fans about the nuance of the game. So that they can enjoy the little things when a play isn't going to lead to a dunk or a 3, but the fan can see something happening and understand what's about to happen in the next 10 seconds because of what they are watching. In order to educate the fans, the NBA has to clean up it's officiating. People who don't understand the game that well know that it's bad. People who have been watching for decades have a hard time even making it to the end of a game because it's so bad. Educating casual fans while leaving the officiating unaddressed will just cause more people to quit watching. I honestly feel like the NBA is sports entertainment at this point. It's not even a true sport any longer. It's on the same level as professional wrestling.

[@JohnwayneNOgacy]

Glad to see the channel doing well . But we need you on Bulls central my guy

[@And.One.Hoops1]

I've been on both my man! Posting more on Bulls Central

[@Zett76]

You lost me at the "inferior players of the past" take. Their work ethic was impecable. They would have easily adjusted to today's game. Bad take. Thumbs down.

[@Kodreanu23]

This direct comparison of era's stats is dumb. 3 defensive seconds rule, no hand check, carrying the ball, traveling... The regular season games sometimes look like sunday fitness games. Schemes have improved, no doubt. But many of today's players wouldn't blossom so much if the paint wasn't that open. Game lacks intensity. The three pointers are not boring, but playing "long game" with three pointers (jacking them up knowing it will benefit long term) has taken out the passion of the moment

[@tirosc]

I have been a league pass subscriber since 2013 and terminated it since last season. My personal problem with these 2 years and further is how the current CBA has lowered the quality of basketball. Watching teams with all-stars that performed and win championships only to become average due to budget problems and turn that championship team to become an average team is such a turn-off. I don't blame just the CBA, it's the GMs that can't adapt to change, it's the coaches that can't utilize the new players, it's the players who can't execute the play, absolutely. But you also can't argue how the CBA just doesn't gel well with the ever-increasing player contracts and supermax contracts.

[@ianemory5800]

For me it's just that every fucking team is pretty much the same. OKC does play defense, but by in large every team is trying to do the same thing. Like in the NFL has the Lions, Ravens, Chiefs, and Bills and all of those teams play different styles of basketball. I've watched less basketball this year than I have ever. I hate to say it but I think the idea that people just can't watch a two hour game is cope for the NBA. The NFL ratings are going up and people will say "yeah, but that's the NFL." College Football Ratings are going up. Then they'll go "Well that's just football" The MLB ratings were the highest they have been in seven years. The Premier league hit a record for NBC last year. The WNBA could be a flash in the pan due to Clark, but when you've got so many leagues that are doing better than in previous years I have a hard time saying "People just don't want to watch TV anymore." The NFL has pretty significant rule changes almost every year and points of emphasis ever year. The MLB just had cataclysmic changes to it's game. Change is the only way to fix this. They've got to find a way to diversify the style of play. Whether that's removing the corner 3 or something else they've got to make changes.

[@HeyYouSA]

I agree that all-star format still sucks but you can't deny the NBA cup success as least from the perspective of players giving a crap and actually trying hard.

[@linsithebe7080]

You cannot filter out Social media, its like filtering out TV in the 1950s. You just have to live with it and be precise about the message, stop blaming your fans.

[@Imaspookykitty]

Id be watching games but yourube tv wont show local games anymore.

[@claude_k]

Very interesting elements to ponder. Thanks. Also simple access to watching the games is a real problem!

[@And.One.Hoops1]

I do agree with access to the games, which I should have called out in the video

[@kedrprao]

Ratings fall has nothing to do with basketball "product". One biggest reason why ratings are bad is that NBA players are too political now. Most NBA stars are constantly endorsing Democrats while calling Republicans evil. If you say almost half the country is wrong openly, then why tf they would watch NBA? I don't remember Jordan, Kareem or Kobe openly being political, and neither does any MLB/NFL/NHL superstar are political. Most of the sports stars except NBA stars are quite diplomatic while talking politics. I think Silver needs to grow a pair and straight up ban NBA players from talking about politics.

[@alphaq1548]

Too many fouls and stoppages. It’s so boring watching free throws every minute.

[@seanj666]

I hear your argument. You say people don't have the attention spans to watch 2hr plus games. If that's the case then why is the NFL with it's 2hr plus games doing just fine and the ratings are better than ever lol. This video is just cope. Basketball just ain't what it used to be and people have moved on.

[@And.One.Hoops1]

.....Because football is only one game a week vs 3 or 4

[@AndreInThe416]

I watched a game from 20 yrs ago online. It was far more entertaining. Crowd more intense as were the players. Your logic fails with younger fans as they dont have those memories.

[@vsc1988]

The crazy thing about it and I am not even a LeBron guy but once he retires you don’t have a true superstars in the league besides Curry. All the new generation plays kind of a boring play style of basketball or low IQ basketball. There isn’t one person I’ve seen that I can say yeah this is his league now. Luka isn’t a two way star and that hurts his superstar status. Edwards isn’t a killer like SG’s of the past and that hurts his status. SGA gets close because he is a two way player but isn’t drawing enough attention. I think that’s more so on the NBA for not putting a bigger spotlight on OKC. Booker doesn’t play defense and can’t create for others so there is no superstar status there. Morant is fun to watch but also isn’t dominated enough. Wemby has potential but it’s gonna take a few years before he is in that conversation. Curry is that guy to watch but his team is older and so is he too so who knows if he can win one more. I can’t say anybody in Boston because that Celtics team is just a deep. You can’t give me a guy 27 years or younger who is great and who can be the face of the league. Most nights these all star type players are calling off or refuse to play both ends of the ball. So when LeBron retires we are gonna have a hard time figuring out who is the face. This feels a lot like 1970’s where there was good players and some fun ones but there wasn’t a Magic, Bird, or Jordan to watch yet. That’s one piece of why viewership is down the other piece is the NBA made it harder to watch my local team play basketball. That TV deal is gonna hurt them for a few years. Unless someone starts playing at the level of Magic, Jordan, or Bird. Popular with take a hit. We no longer have those NBA stories of guys playing street ball and being discovered. Ja was the last one and partly why he plays with that chip on his shoulder. Most of the players in the NBA played AAU and learned how to play the exact same from the same older players so no one figured out there own unique style. It’s why you see everyone shooting threes because those older players are teaching them how to stay in the NBA later in your career. But not how to carve your own path. That’s something you gotta learn for yourself.

[@aptibabayt]

You're missing the point, my friend. It's not that players are worse today, or that the shooting pct are worse. Nobody says that. It's the watchability of the games that declines, because many people don't care to see a 3 point shootout.

[@And.One.Hoops1]

You didn’t watch the video, did you?

[@aptibabayt]

@@And.One.Hoops1 Until the end.

[@clutchbuckets3478]

@@And.One.Hoops1 no he didnt lmao🤣🤣

[@mr.kwamid-86_43]

There's too many games and the ALL-STAR weekend sucks! That's da facking prablems 😢

[@mrawesome7175]

There’s always been 82 games !!!!!!!!!!!! All star break isn’t the problem either .

[@I_Ace]

I like watching NBA daily tbh. But dude the last couple of years the allstar game has been ass and the NBA cup I didnt really watch or care to turn on my TV for it at all. Also all my favorite teams to watch suck or are injured and KZbin TV doesnt even let me watch the Bulls when I live in chicago. Its BS

[@ryananderson5202]

Clickbait

[@And.One.Hoops1]

How?

[@00cristianH]

I remember back in the 2000s each team had their own style, something to take advantage of the type players they had to work for the system that fit them. The Pistons would play hard nose defense to make up for their lack of offense. The Suns would run that famous 7 second offense off a made or miss shot. Orlando would play inside out with Dwight and Hedo and Rashard Lewis. Utah would still be running the pick and roll offense with Boozer and Williams. The Lakers had the triangle offense with Shaq/Pau and Kobe. Roll players currently are more talented than the roll players from the past, it's still doesn't make up for that the only identity that most teams bring is "this team shoots a lot of 3s and have good wing defenders". The only teams that I can think of that bring their own unique style that separates themselves from the rest of the league are probably the Warrior's with their ball movement and maybe the Lakers with their focus on scoring at the rim and getting fouls to make up for their lack of perimeter shooting. I still watch the games but man I can only watch a team run a 3 on 1 fast break for it to end on a 3 point shot so many times before I turn it off. When I first started watching basketball you had players being so creative with how they would score. Yes I understand hero ball isn't for "analytics" but I'm not watching to see a player take the best percentage shot and more efficient shot. I'm trying to watch for entertainment. It was fun back when Kobe used to make crazy ridiculous shots, Iverson crossing over bigger defenders, Wade making circus shots or Dwight posting up and setting up someone for a dunk.

[@petetroglodyte1860]

this is a very shallow low level analysis

[@And.One.Hoops1]

Oh yeah, how so?

[@kaloudiousbanks8412]

There is no skill in the game anymore. It doesn't take skill to throw up a shot. I dislike it. I grew up in the 90s. Offense was inside out, cuts, competitive you name it. It's terrible now😮😮😮

[@nickroshkowski8576]

You still need skill. Is just the skills are all the same

[@euro51116]

Theres literally never been more skill. All the stuff MJ was doing and blowing minds in 1992, G-Leaguers on 2-way contracts can do. The problem is the modern playstyle is too repetitive and everyone is focusing on efficiency in the exact same ways. The warriors were special but everyone is trying to do it now. Like the saying goes, "if everyone is special, then no one is".

[@cheap272]

if there is no skill why arent u an allstar making 50ms a year?

[@badat2k191]

It’s not just nostalgia. The game has fundamentally changed in the last few years and it is far less enjoyable to watch for many people. I love the players but there is a lot wrong with the league right now

[@wrencisjohnson9550]

It is NOT attention span. Caitlin has no problem getting people to watch whole games, even in a less physically impressive league. We can objectively challenge the notion that today’s nba players are more skilled than in the past. Look at how they perform under different rules both in ncaa play and international play and they simply don’t look as impressive. The players aren’t actually significantly more skilled. PGs and Cs have been replaced with monolithic “wings” due to rule erosion over time and thus it LOOKS positionless and better shooting when this is really just selection bias. You saw when the game was called differently last year even in the nba, scoring fell IMMEDIATELY. Enforce 1999 rules today and you’ll see that the players aren’t nearly as “skilled” as many believe. This isn’t blind, old head posturing. You can see it when they play with more physical international rules. Luka said directly, it’s easier to score in the nba than in Europe. Why? Scoring-tilted rules in the nba.

[@bandjolyn]

Anyone considered that this was an election year? I know that weighed on me for a while. The outcome was the outcome, and I'm making big moves in my life accordingly. I ain't got time for the nba.