Video of the day.

by Jon Lewis

18 years ago

Game 3 draws 14.5 million viewers.

Jon Lewis

Jon Lewis has been covering the sports media industry on a daily basis since 2006 as the founder and main writer of Sports Media Watch. You can contact him here or on the social media websites X (Twitter) or Bluesky.

Atlanta Braves including Jim Jarvis (74), Mike Yastrzemski (18), Matt Olson (28) and Drake Baldwin (30) stand of the field during a moment of silence for Ted Turner before a baseball game against the Seattle Mariners, Wednesday, May 6, 2026, in Seattle. (AP Photo/Stephen Brashear)

Ted Turner, whose cable business transformed TV sports, dies

by Jon Lewis

41 minutes ago

Ted Turner, the media mogul and team owner whose TBS "SuperStation" helped pave the way the era of cable...

News: Disney, Comcast-Scripps, Peter Schrager and more

by Derek Futterman

10 hours ago

Disney has currently not "engaged with" the NFL on early renewal discussions; Comcast and Scripps reach a new carriage...

Carolina Hurricanes' Logan Stankoven (22) controls the puck in front of Philadelphia Flyers' Denver Barkey (52) during the first period of Game 1 of an NHL hockey Stanley Cup second-round playoff series in Raleigh, N.C., Saturday, May 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Karl DeBlaker)

Stanley Cup follows banner first round viewership with strong start to second

by Jon Lewis

11 hours ago

The NHL enjoyed a record-setting opening round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs, and it does not appear that the...

Boston Celtics' Jayson Tatum (right) and Philadelphia 76ers' Joel Embiid (left) embrace following Philadelphia's victory in Game 7 in a first-round NBA basketball playoffs series, Saturday, May 2, 2026 in Boston. (AP Photo/Jim Davis)

NBA caps strong first round with milestone audience for Derby-fueled Sixers-Celtics

by Jon Lewis

1 day ago

The first round of the NBA Playoffs had a strong close, with Sixers-Celtics hitting a milestone leading out of...

Comments 19

Andrew says:

18 years ago

Sean O said: “
I don’t think ABC/ESPN has gotten that much out of their NBA deal.”

well, if that were true they probably wouldn’t have committed to an EIGHT (!) year extension…they probably would have only done three or four more years if any. Clearly there is something about the NBA that ESPN values greatly.

One of my major complaints about this new arrangement though is that the All-Star Game is not shown on ABC. Instead, TNT gets exclusive coverage. That’s the one event where the league’s best players show off, and an event that could draw some casual fans as well. Harder to do that when it’s on cable.
Robert says:

18 years ago

I don’t hate the NHL; I ‘m indifferent towards it. On the other hand, its fans are an entirely different matter. NHL fans always seem to want to prop up their struggling favorite sport on the back of the NBA instead of on its own merit. Before you take on the NBA, you need to beat out the spelling bee, poker, jump rope, and hopscotch in TV ratings, regularly.

Most people don’t hate the NHL; they don’t care about it enough to, sorry.
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

Then who are these people that hate the NHL? They must hate white people…Personally, I don’t like basketball. If the players were all white I still wouldn’t care about it…but if I was 7 feet tall I might think differently
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

Why do you hate the NHL so much?

Hypocrite!

If you can’t take somebody bashing your fav sport, then don’t bash somebody else’s.
Robert says:

18 years ago

Is everyone that doesn’t follow the NBA a bigot? Of course not, but most of the people that state that they hate the “NBA” are (the “NBA” being a euphemism for something else that they hate, I’ll let you figure it out). People are usually indifferent towards sports they don’t enjoy, not “hateful.” But somehow people that claim that they haven’t watched the sport since the days of Bird, for some odd reason, always exclaim the loudest that they “hate” something that they haven’t watched in eons. Why do you think trolls with “jamal’s” shtick show up in topics about the NBA only?

The fact that you chose to comment on what I said before your weak response to “Jamal” was telling.

Don’t worry, I’ll continue to post. However, I understand why you want me stop posting the truth about this matter.
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

Wow, this guy is a real hater! So everybody who does not watch the NBA is a biggot?

As for Jamal, totally inappropriate.

You should both do us all a favour and stop posting because you are both losers!
Robert says:

18 years ago

Look at the little insecure NHL loving bigot above (“jamal”). He’s not man enough to express his frustrations in real life, so he hides behind the anonymity of the internet. Hell, he’s not smart enough to express himself in his own words on the internet, so he uses tired stereotypical ‘jive’ talk while in character (even he knows his own voice is worthless).

He doesn’t follow his favorite sport because it’s actually high quality; he follows it because seeing a bunch of non-athletes that look like him is the only thing that makes him feel good about himself. It’s too bad for him that his sport has been reduced to being followed by mostly insecure bigoted idiots in the U.S. Unfortunately; his favorite sport can’t even tap into his market fully, because NASCAR has a firm grip on that.

Cowards like him are the biggest wastes of life on the planet, and they’re too stupid to know it.
Chris Kreager says:

18 years ago

This wasn’t the only part of NBA history that concluded in 2002.

That was also the final year of the old ‘best-of-five first round’ format.
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

anon 3:32 pm, ignore Morgan Wick. He’s not a basketball fan. A few days ago he posted that basketball is boring, so go figure.

-Andrew
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

yo son this your man jamal comin straight at you from the firty south, you know what i’m sayin, this the ATL up in here. Yo da fool who makes the NBA on ABC must be up out his mind. This clown need to look at NBC as a template when he be designing the production, you feel me? Them NBC cats knew what was up, you know you were only getting the best efforts from them. 2002 was tha worst year of my life, NBA on NBC ended and the KFC on my block moved to uptown. Give a sucka a break.
UTP says:

18 years ago

At the end of the day…its all about who puts the money in…and gets out the most…isnt it?
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

HEY MORGAN WICK—THERE IS NOTHING “LOL” ABOUT THE SITUATION, OATMEAL BRAIN. THIS IS ONE OF THEMOST SERIOUS MATTERS IN RESTORING NBA GLORY. BROADCAST TELEVISION IS WHERE THE MAJORITY OF FANS CONSUME THE NBA PRODUCT ESPECIALLY THE CASUAL AUDIENCE THAT THELEAGUE SO BADLY NEEDS TO REGAIN. THE BASKETBALL VIWWING EXPERIENCE IS LESS PLEASURABLE ON ABC THEN NBC, SO FANS WILL CONTINUE TO LEAVE UNTIL THEY GET BACK WHAT THEY HAD COME TO EXPECT. WHY SHOULD THE FANS SETTLE FOR ANYTHING LESS? IF U WENT FROM JESSICAL ALBA 2 ROSIE O’DONNEL WOULD U BE COMING BACK FOR HELPINGS LIKE YOU USED TO? I THINK NOT.
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

Least ABC could do is use the theme. Why don’t they just use the theme, NBC doesn’t own the rights and Tesh said he would sell it to anyone. ABC is so arrongant they insist on doing it their way, even though television is about THE FANS!!! and not their facking egos in regards to production. The lackluster theme, the random songs they play before tiemouts, those corporate ESPN suits can stick it.

Why is there no host like Musburger or Costas who introduces thge games and they sends in down to theplay-by play like Costas did with Marv? Idiots. They are ruining basketball. Kids today don’t know how incredible baskeball can be. I don’t blame them fornot watching. ABC=conspiracy to bring down NBA viewership because it is interfering with Hannah Montana reruns. They know if less people are wathing basketball more people will be watching Hannah Montana. (lol lol lol lol)
Seriously though how can they be so awful? something isn’t right? What is behind it?
Sean O says:

18 years ago

NBC Sports said that it’s only targeting sports properties that are worth the investment a few years back, when they got rid of the NBA to begin with.

They only hopped back on the NFL bandwagon if they were promised flex scheduling. And the NHL deal is set up so the rights are miniscule. And they’ve focused on events like tennis & golf & horse racing that are event-orientated as opposed to paying outrageous fees for a season’s worth of games.

I don’t think ABC/ESPN has gotten that much out of their NBA deal.
Andrew says:

18 years ago

If NBC really wanted it back they would have at least tried to make an offer to the NBA when ABC’s first term ended. But that didn’t happen. I think they don’t want to spend the kind of money the NBA wants, and ESPN/ABC does. So here we go. We’ve got the current arrangement for eight more seasons after the conclusion of these Finals. I think ABC is FINALLY improving their coverage though. They used to be just flat out awful. Their presentation still leaves a bit to be desired but it’s going in the right direction. JMHO of course. That was then, this is now. let’s get used to it.
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

That was so good..I Bet NBC wished they kept it now that they got boring NHL LOL
Anonymous says:

18 years ago

This video is among my favorites on my youtube’s profile.

Awesome to say the least.
Sports on a Schtick says:

18 years ago

…and there still remains weeping and gnashing of teeth from NBA fans.

I hope you’re happy Stern.
Morgan Wick says:

18 years ago

Cue a gazillion “LOL ABC sux bring back NBA on NBC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1111111!!!!!!!!!!1!!!!111111!11!!eleven!” comments.