Complex does their best Max Kellerman impersonation
SOURCE -- The NFL is losing its footing as “America’s Sport.” Last season’s Super Bowl, which featured two teams with rabid fan bases in the Eagles and the Patriots, was the league’s least-viewed since the Steelers and the Cardinals faced off in 2009, according to the Wall Street Journal. This year’s season opener between the Eagles and Falcons, according to SportsBusiness Daily, was the lowest rated since 2008. Meanwhile, since 2013-2014, the NBA has seen viewership rise each of the last four seasons and the NBA’s average viewer is around 42 years old as compared to the NFL’s average viewer being 50. Football, it feels like, is increasingly losing out to basketball and the reasons are obvious.
I expected to wake up on Monday morning and be bombarded by some foolish takes. I figured we’d get some crazy takes regarding the Warriors’ victory over the Houston Rockets. I could picture it already, “Are the Warriors better without KD?” headlining First Take. What I did not expect was this preposterous take coming from Complex.
Using viewers as a measurement of which sport is gaining popularity is a bold move, especially considering the fact that the viewership shows just how dominant football is compared to basketball. Sure, viewership of the NFL’s biggest game, the Super Bowl, has been down. In fact, the 2019 Super Bowl commanded a lowly 98.2 million viewers. How pathetic is that? The 2018 Super Bowl had just six-times as many viewers as the NBA Finals in that same year. Sad.
Using the growth of NBA viewership to demonstrate how the sport is foolish. Yeah, NBA viewership is up compared to years previous. But how significant of a jump is it really?
From what I can gather, the reason for such a preposterous take comes down to two things. First, being a prisoner of the moment. Sunday was a huge day for the NBA and its fans. There were tow Game Sevens on the same day and both of them came down to the final seconds. The Trail Blazers kicked it off by defeating the Denver Nuggets on the road in a Game Seven, and it was followed up by Kawhi Leanard making one of the craziest game-winning shots in NBA history. So anyone who was witness to these two games couldn’t help but think that the NBA was becoming a premier league.
The second reason is because of social media. It’s a well-known fact that social media is a vacuum, and that makes Twitter the Dyson of social media platforms. Twitter is a unique platform and luckily for everyone, it’s not a very realistic reflection of world views. So, when the NBA thrives on Twitter with flashy highlights, dunks, and off-the-court drama, it may seem that the NBA dominates the country in terms of what is popular. That, however, is not the case.
Sure, the NBA is a growing sport and is extremely popular among younger crowds. But saying that the NBA has surpassed the NFL as America’s sport is the craziest take of the day, on a morning that also featured this kind of nonsense.
Impressive stuff by Complex.
Comments