Forget Lakers/Celtics. Just having the Lakers there is good enough.
With the possibility of Spurs/Pistons threatening a season of greatly improved ratings, the NBA has received a welcome and unexpected gift. The Los Angeles Lakers, who a year ago looked like they were on their way to many seasons of Kobe-less mediocrity, are going to the NBA Finals.
The Lakers are easily the biggest draw in the NBA, as their games are typically the highest rated during the regular season and playoffs. The Lakers are responsible for the lone double-digit NBA Finals average rating on ABC, and will likely end up being part of the two highest rated Conference Finals over the same period. In 2005, the one year this decade they missed the playoffs, NBA ratings tanked.
The Celtics’ presence would help ratings as well, but not by nearly as much. The Celtics are the Red Sox to the Lakers’ Yankees — in that, even though they are popular, they in no way measure up to their most heated rival when it comes to attracting viewers.
Of the four teams to make the NBA Finals multiple times in the past ten years, the Lakers have attracted the highest average rating. The Lakers averaged an 11.4 in their four NBA Finals appearances, compared to a 9.6 for the Pistons (2 appearances), a 7.9 for the Nets (2 appearances) and an 8.1 for the now-vanquished Spurs (4 appearances).
The Lakers have drawn a single-digit rating only 3 times in 20 NBA Finals games this decade (Game 2 in 2000 and 2002 and Game 1 in 2004). By comparison, the defending champion Spurs have drawn single digit ratings in 17 of their 22 NBA Finals games — and have played in the fifteen lowest rated finals games of the past 27 years.
That alone seems to indicate a substantial increase in ratings for this year’s NBA Finals, no matter the Lakers’ opponent. The last time the Lakers played the Pistons in the Finals was four years ago, when the series averaged an 11.6 on ABC. A rematch would likely draw lower ratings, but could easily average a double-digit rating.
Meanwhile, a Lakers/Celtics series could potentially draw the highest average rating of any NBA Finals since Michael Jordan’s last shot against Utah in 1998.
For now, the NBA can be satisfied with either match-up (though far more satisfied with L.A./Boston). Regardless of who the Lakers face, the league is heading into the Finals with its biggest draw and its biggest star. While Dwyane Wade and the Heat gave ABC a ratings boost in 2006, and though LeBron James and the Cavaliers were supposed to do the same in 2007, Kobe Bryant and the Lakers are as close as you can get to a lock for some of the highest ratings in years.
The only negative outcome from the Lakers’ series-clinching Game 5 win tonight is that TNT is done until October. Thankfully for David Stern and every ABC executive, the Lakers cannot say the same.
