The NBL could very well be the fastest growing sports television product in Australia, but you wouldn’t know it listening to some of the game’s followers.
‘The TV deal is holding the game back’ is a familiar cry of fans.
‘We need to ditch Ten and ONE’ is another.
Even journalist Boti Nagy – who’s doing a fantastic job pumping out NBL content right now both for News Corp Australia publications and on his own blog – is a subtle yet constant part of the chorus.
From one Boti report this season: “We’ve had the demerger and with it, all the BA-signed contracts the NBL inherited and honoured, some to its detriment.”
From another: “NBL Pty Ltd couldn’t step as far away from BA as it wanted with the demerger, due to existing TV and other contracts it inherited.”
From a story on the state of the league website: “NBL Pty Ltd is as frustrated as its growing fan base because it feels hamstrung by yet another BA deal it inherited and is stuck with for the immediate future.”
Less inconspicuously, over the winter Boti expressed the view that “if Ten wants out, why not let them?”
Plus this week, in a blog proposing a ‘Winter Superleague’ one of the key advantages raised was that “the league can do a different TV deal”.
Reading the thoughts of fans and other prominent figures can make it seem like the league is pinned down against its will, unable to grow until it’s free from this horrible TV contract.
But, as in a lot of things, there’s speculation and there’s reality.
And the reality is capital city NBL television ratings are up 44 per cent on this time last year.
Last season’s ratings themselves were 58 percent up on the previous season.
Compare that to another growing Aussie sports competition, the A-League, who benefitted from Alessandro Del Piero’s arrival last year and a free-to-air game each week on SBS2 this year.
The A-League is up 27 percent on this time last year after somewhere between a 23 and 39 percent rise last season (depending on which paragraph of this article you believe).
Now, the A-League still rates well above the NBL. Their average audience with every game being shown is 120,700, the NBL’s with two games – one on the primary channel of a major network, both typically involving capital city teams – is 52,750.
But the point here is that the current TV deal in its present form is working incredibly well for the NBL.
Ask Joe Blow on the street what the fastest growing sport on TV in Australia is and the last thing you’d expect to hear is the NBL – but it’s not inconceivable.
What has to be remembered is that the NBL is lucky to have a free-to-air deal at all.
It teamed up with Ten during the brief window they were trying to grow ONE as a sports-only channel and were hungry for any form of local content.
It was in the right place at the right time.
Despite superior viewing numbers, the A-League never found itself in such a position. Instead, they had eight seasons as a subscription-only product before free-to-air picked it up – and even when the deal came it wasn’t with one of the major networks.
To be fair, some of the NBL’s TV critics are more concerned with NBL.tv being the service providing the non-Ten games.
That’s something that should be looked at. Performance and quality of production issues affect the enjoyability of the site, and it must be remembered the business model itself is in its infancy.
Is it the best strategy that all those games are basically only available to existing fans (given the cost of subscription)?
Like with the free-to-air deal, we have to be careful about assuming there’s a market for the content outside of the current set-up. Remember it was only after NBL.tv was introduced that every NBL game was broadcast.
That said, if the NBL can wriggle out of some or all of its NBL.tv contract at the end of this season, it’d have to be heavily considered.
As for the Ten and ONE deal, we shouldn’t get too caught up with that. It’s far more of a positive than a negative.
And with the league taking back some of the control over production recently, it can only get better.
Last week’s games featured historical footage and a miked-up Trevor Gleeson. Even the horrible sneaker graphics were gone. Happy days!
All things considered, the league has a good platform for growth – a platform it was lucky to find itself on – and two more years to make the most of it.
The ratings prior to this year were never going to be enough to get a similar deal, but at the present rate of growth the NBL might just get there.
Rohan
Guest
how much is the deal worth to the nbl?
Double D
Guest
The Deal with TEN/One is Great! The BIG problem is TEN/One are ACTIVELY not promoting the Broadcasts. All of the things they can do to promote a broadcast that cost them, in real terms, ZERO dollars are not done; - no cross-promotion of ANY kind - zero mentions of 'NBL game later tonight' on TEN New sports broadcasts - no mentions or NBL guests on any other TEN/One programs, The Project, A League of their own (although LJ was on, no NBLer's) - no (that I've seen) Ads on TEN/One promoting NBL broadcasts I would love to see some stats of all of the internal adds on TEN/One for all programs, then relate that to the ratings for each program. I believe it would show how TEN/One are actively not promoting NBL broadcasts, but why? Maybe the NBL supporters/team owners/NBL itself, should buy shares in Network Ten? Best way to support and grow the game right? Would only take a couple of mill to get a seat on the board? Thoughts Michael?
Peter
Guest
Until the NBL becomes as big in Australia as the NBA is in the US (and worldwide), I would never advocate them going back to Foxtel or any other pay-tv provider who pops up. When the NBL went with Foxtel in the 90s it limited their TV audience to those who actually had Foxtel, which wasn't many as pay-tv was still in its infancy at the time in Australia. Fox weren't far removed from the days of Galaxy which I believe started in 1993. And of course not everyone who had Fox watched the NBL so there again the TV audience was limited..... For a LOT of years the NBL was out of sight, out of mind for a lot of Australians and it was really only the diehards who watched or attended games. With the current deal they still are not approaching the numbers they achieved in the 80s and 90s, but they aren't losing ground right now either. What does need to be changed is NBL.TV. Right now its not the most professional of productions, but they are better than they were last year. And to add to that, game highlights on the NBL's website need to be free to access, not available only to those who subscribe to NBL.TV......that is the Foxtel thing all over again. Fans should be able to go to the NBL's site and view game highlights or full game replays for free (similar to what the NRL do with their website. Full game replays are available for free from 24 hours after the game started regardless if 9 or Fox was the broadcaster, and highlights are usually up within an hour of the end of the game). Right now that doesn't happen. If your team isn't on FTA and you don't subscribe to NBL.TV then you don't get to see anything of the game.
Michael DiFabrizio
Expert
SportsFreak, yep Perth games do go pretty good with the ratings for the reasons you outline plus also I'd assume the fact they have the biggest draw-card in James Ennis.
TheSportsFreak
Roar Guru
Complaints about NBL.tv are a little hilarious. It's not as if they're stashed with cash. It's not as if they have 14 high definition cameras and an amazing graphics department. No. It's more like a public access TV station taking the reigns. I did notice in last week's Wildcats/Hawks game the past highlights, which was a nice touch. I assume the Perth games are the one's that seem to rate. With right reason too (he says with plenty of bias), but it's live into the East Coast, and there's plenty of Wildcats fans who'd go home after a big win to watch it again. Meanwhile, I've liked that I can actually get a live feed of the Perth games in WA via the NBL.tv site.
Nathan of Perth
Guest
"so I could see the worlds best go at it" Just going to go off on a tangent here (and this is obviously not a knock on you/your post)... You see this phrase/sentiment pop up a lot in Aus, usually used for people talking about not watching A-League/NBL. But although the NBA has better athletes, its not like you don't still see a lot of gaffes and screw-ups; they just tend to get ignored because the expectation is that because the NBA is pre-eminent, there's no room for criticising. I mean one of those world's best in Dwight Howard just basically cost his team a victory against the Lakers by going 5/16 not from the field, but from the charity stripe. That is ludicrously bad, but no one talks about the game being a brickathon, but if an NBL team misses a couple shots people start throwing that term around. Can be pretty irritating.
Francis Curro
Roar Pro
It would be interesting to know how many fans have purchased NBL TV, not sure if you know? I know for that money I would personally prefer to go for NBA league pass (although a little more) so I could see the worlds best go at it. In saying that, the NBL is on the rise.
Jarrad
Guest
I totally agree with this article and I could never understand why people complained about the channel 10 deal, it is a far better deal then we should ever have expected. They did do production like an afterthought, and now NBL is doing it there is some modest improvements.. but I am happy with 10 overall but we could use the occasional add here or there..
Greg
Guest
It's scary to think that the A League easily out rates the NBL, even on FOX Sports. I would like to see a combined Ten/Fox deal, to get more NBL games on TV. NBL.tv sucks and is very unprofessional
ChrisW
Guest
Thanks for the reply Michael, good to see the leagues ratings increase and hopefully Townsville will be ok.
Michael DiFabrizio
Expert
Potentially, Chris. The league (when under the control of Basketball Australia) bought back subscription rights from Ten at the start of last season. That's why NBL.tv emerged. So can Fox be introduced? Well, it's a question of a) whether the contract with Perform Media (those behind NBL.tv) prohibits a Fox deal; and b) when the NBL.tv deal actually expires (all we got at the time was that it was a "multi-year agreement"). If the deal expires at the end of this season, then absolutely it could be done. Ditto if the contract actually allows a deal to be done. Otherwise, it'd have to wait. Which wouldn't be the end of the world - either way there's both a free service and a service fans have to pay for.
ChrisW
Guest
Would it be possible to have a joint FTA/fox deal?
Michael DiFabrizio
Expert
Kyle, I've seen it. I'm wearing a Melbourne Heart polo as I type this. The topic here though is growth in television viewers. Not overall numbers, but growth from season to season. And while the A-League has *very* impressive growth numbers this season and last, the NBL's are better still. That doesn't mean the rest of what you say isn't true - overall, the A-League is well and truly miles ahead of the NBL and I admit as much in the article further down, where you also see the ratings figures that I'm referring to.
Kyle Stewart
Roar Pro
"The NBL could very well be the fastest growing sports television product in Australia" Have you seen the strides the A-League is making? I could probably talk to about 70% of people and manage a respectable conversation about the a-league. The NBL you'd have to first explain the teams and make sure they understand NBL is Australian and the NBA is America.
Scott Pryde
Expert
I would think the ABC, who also broadcast the WNBL should be able to pick up the NBL as well.... Maybe show more than 2 games a week with one of those on delay! That would give the NBL a leap, which will hopefully lead to bigger things for the sport
Michael DiFabrizio
Expert
Just wanted to clarify the following paragraph guys: Despite superior viewing numbers, the A-League never found itself in such a position. Instead, they had eight seasons as a subscription-only product before free-to-air picked it up – and even when the deal came it wasn’t with one of the major networks. The point here is not that the A-League had a terrible deal with Fox over those years, the dollars were great for the sport. The point is that the NBL's circumstances were unique. For example, the A-League were never in a position where the benefits of being on FTA outweighed the money on offer from Fox. The NBL did find themselves in such a position (Fox, if my memory serves, had the right to bid last at the time). Hopefully that clears up any confusion and sorry for the ambiguous wording in the original article!
Jorji Costava
Guest
From what I know the NBL is having issues with Ch. 10 keeping the sport at all. If there is no 10, there won't be a 7,9 or ABC/SBS to bail them out. It will be straight web streaming. NBL has got a long way to go to turn it around yet. They have hardly any clubs left. One out of all Victoria and that is the heartland of the sport.
Michael DiFabrizio
Expert
Cheers for the comment Kris. Are other FTA networks banging down the door? You would strongly suspect not, at least based on the numbers the NBL was pulling prior to this year (most games did not have FTA-worthy audiences). Perhaps if the current trend is maintained and improved upon that may change. Btw I too am enjoying the A-League-NBL double (when I don't start to doze off during the second leg, which has happened a couple of times already not gonna lie).
Kris Swales
Expert
On the Ten/One thing - are any other FTA channels seriously knocking down the NBL's door to be involved? Have they ever, even in the glory days? The NBL probably can't do so officially, but some backdoor marketing of the Friday night game as the second half of a summer sport double-header with the A-League couldn't hurt. It's certainly been easing the Friday Night Football withdrawal symptoms for me.