Hoops

NBL wants to be the #1 summer sport.

Well swish with globalisation now kids growing up can watch any sport they want. Not forced to follow the local code like back in the day because nothing else was shown. So soon local sports will die with the older generations because the young are only interested in relevant world sports. Whether that helps local leagues of these world sports is the question. But the local/Commonwealth sports will die eventually due to their irrelevancy, globalisation baby.

I think we have a very small market when compared to US and the main European sports. So our small market is overcrowded with as many sports option as they have and our particapants expect similar rewards to what is available oversees. (maybe not the same as the real superstars but maybe unrealalistic in a crowded market).
Then we have supporters and sponsors etc expecting "worlds best" performances and AFL is the only sport where we can be confidently claim that. Global sports such as soccer and basketball will struggle because they are not "worlds best" and "worlds best" is generally so accessable in todays world. Its gonna take a massive injection of marketing money to get the NBL to have a real strong mainstream presence.

We will never have a Big4 like mass following of sport.

Here in Aus we are all tribal. It's either you're 100% AFL/NRL and then cricket in the summer and that's it. A very mono-sport culture. Year 2017 and we are still divided, north vs. south/Sydney vs. Melbourne is ridiculous and shows how small-minded we still are in 2017.

@Cram, I don't necessarily agree, if you are talking about say dollars and sponsors of sports.

Our major sponsors here are often likely to support different sports and sometimes a whole league, but I do agree that the US market is not a fair comparison.

One thing is for certain, elite sport and business are now mutually inclusive and need each other more than ever.

The U.S. is certainly a difficult model to copy. 50 different cities have at least 1 major league sports team, and about a dozen have all of the big 4. We cant ever match that. And yeah what it means is they can work together as they tend to know if youre a bulls fan youre also highly likely to be a blackhawks and bears fan. Here our major sports are so splintered within cities that you cant make those assumptions. If you were to work with other clubs you could end up alienating some fans.

The NBL should do a "I'd like to see that" ad campaign and enlist athletes from other codes to talk about our league.

A-League started in 2005/06 and plans for it had been in place years before so can't really say it took off due to the 2006 world cup. Maybe you bandwagoners hopped on then would be more accurate?

Agree Bear, i think that is how sport used to be like. Clubs would cross promote other sports, and there was a sense of community spirit between various codes.

Now, they purely compete against each other. They try to crush the opposition and reduce them to a forgotten sport.

Sponsors and media are largely to blame.

As a comparison, in the US, most big cities have the 'Big 4' teams - NBA, MLB, NFL, NHL - and they all seem to exist perfectly well with each other and all make millions of dollars and have saturated exposure. (Huge populations and billionaire owners help of course) a similar thing on a smaller scale can work here too.

Kestleman perhaps wants to be known as the next Frank Lowie, hardly the same financial muscle, however in the scheme of things you can draw some parallels.

There is room for both the NBL/WNBL and the A-League/W-League and Cricket/Big Bash, if everyone understands that what needs to happen is to create a bigger pie, not try to feed off each others crumbs.

^ because the A League spends like its a European powerhouse.

Its returns are no where near as good as what they put in.

and some BBL teams play in a 100k stadium. sp can't really compare

"NBL had 726K last season vs BBL 1.054M so not really that far off in total attendance actually."

Every NBL club played 28 games versus every BBL clubs playing 8 games. And they still smashed the NBL...so yeah, nah.

A-League 1.77M. Ok we are way off ;/

But NBL is indoor vs. these outdoor sports so not the best barometer.

NBL had 726K last season vs BBL 1.054M so not really that far off in total attendance actually.

Looks like they are using the average trick. But a high average over hardly any games is easy. True top 10 in total attendance has #10 at 10million... BBL only had 1mil.

BBL is way bigger than NBL but nowhere newr the top 10 globally hahahhaa. It's a super short season yet that's being claimed? Wow, how myopic are Australian media!

Top then is here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_attendance_figures_at_domestic_professional_sports_leagues#Top_leagues_in_total_attendance

In case anyone wanted to watch the 15 minutes of rah rah ...

"If the NBL isn't a the number 1 summer league sport in Aus then what is?"

The Big Bash League sits inside the top-10 most attended sports leagues in the world - https://www.google.com.au/amp/s/amp.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/big-bash-league-jumps-into-top-10-of-most-attended-sports-leagues-in-the-world-20160110-gm2w8z.html - & averages close to 1 million viewers per game on TV. The NBL has made serious inroads in recent years - nowhere near the BBL - but is lucky to get 20,000 watching on Fox. You are kidding yourself if the NBL is even close to the BBL.

Australian football definitely had a bad patch in the group after the "golden generation", and that's why they're struggling now as those guys should be the stars of the last 5 years, or at least silid vets. I think the next group (the current under 25s) are better so I think things are on the up, but clearly our basketball team is better right now.

It's funny re: 2006 in football since back then you could fill up a fantasy team on EPL website with a starting eleven just of Aussies!

Now fast forward to 2017 there are only a few playing in EPL and other top Euro leagues.

Whereas in basketball it is the opposite, the momentum is up and unlike football seems like our production line won't be stopped any time soon :D

I know ;(

when Socceroos were actually good (think back to World Cup 2006 and how we got elimintated dodgily by Italy)

Having an Olympic team consisting solely of NBA players doesn't seem like something that will help the NBL all that much.

The Channel 10 deal helped revolutionise the Big Bash for cricket and give it mainstream exposure. NBL is doing great with their TV deals and hopefully one day we can land a FTA deal on one of the big 3 networks thats willing to invest and promote the league. That might be a while away but I think we are on the right track.

Having an Olympic team consisting solely of NBA players doesn't seem like something that will help the NBL all that much.

What may change the above is how bad the Socceroos are now... hardly any Aus players who are elite. Remember A-League was launched when Socceroos were actually good (think back to World Cup 2006 and how we got elimintated dodgily by Italy)

Whereas basketball now the Boomers could have 100% NBA players for the next Olympics. and were 4th in the world based on last Olympics. 2020 baby!

Cricket (lol - a few more generations and this will die, awful/boring sport that has to keep reducing hours played for relevance)

then Football, even though it's my sport the league that is A-League is horrible to watch and comparing to another Aussie world sport league such as basketball/the NBL the NBL owns it yet in regards to quality yet all the hype and BS has caused A-League to be "bigger"... sigh

Sadly A League is still bigger than the NBL in terms of crowd numbers and particularly Television ratings.

Hopefully this changes

Cricket

If the NBL isn't a the number 1 summer league sport in Aus then what is?

Isn't the season launch for media? I got multiple emails from BA about it, today alone. (I don't think I'm on any media list for the NBL.)