The NBA Finals Are Supposed to Be Epic—Do They Still Feel That Way?

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The atmosphere in Indianapolis last week was electric. The city was taken over by NBA Finals madness. Thousands of Indiana Pacers fans inside the arena buzzed with energy and ear-splitting vigor during games 3 and 4. The games felt big.

On television, however, where millions of basketball fans have watched the game, the finals have felt a little different.

The presentation has been humdrum. The games, broadcast on ABC, haven’t looked all that dissimilar to other playoff games, or even regular-season ones. The Larry O’Brien trophy hasn’t been at center court for more than a decade. The decals were too slippery, commissioner Adam Silver said. The elegant Finals script is missing. Even the broadcast crew keeps changing.

Does this actually matter? No. Game 1 was awesome. Game 2 felt like a Shai Gilgeous-Alexander debut party on a national stage. Games 3 and 4 were full of verve.

But the reason this has remained an issue is because it is of a larger piece: the feeling that the game itself matters less and less. How it looks, then, is another data point in that conversation.

Basketball has felt more attenuated from the league in recent years. That is brought up by fans, media and folks working in and around the NBA. It is reflected in the media coverage (yes, The Athletic contributes to that), where the transaction cycle is the be-all and end-all. Pregame shows are often about the hot trade talk of the day or the latest coaching search. The broadcasts have become dominated by heavy-handed sports gambling ads — an industry embraced by leagues and teams alike — and the halftime show is pushing prop bets to the masses. The games themselves feel diluted because of it.

NBC, the league’s new TV partner, is bringing back player introductions before games in an attempt to make them feel like an event, perhaps an admission the broadcasts have strayed too far.

The finals, at least, were supposed to be a salve from that. With a pomp and circumstance and aesthetic to match. If the beauty marks of a finals game had been replaced by a clean court, at least that could be understood, if perhaps still unsatisfying. Instead, they have been replaced by ads. So many of them that the court can sometimes look like a NASCAR vehicle. There are the two big ads for the company that has naming rights for the arena, on either side of the logo. There are the electronic panels between the two teams’ benches that pipe in more ads. There are two decals along the sideline for the streaming TV provider. Actually, there are sometimes four ads on the screen at once for that streamer. The Finals script has been replaced on the baseline by the league’s beer sponsor.

The NBA Finals, presented to you by this corporation and that other one. But that’s why so many fans have been annoyed by how the game has been presented to them.

The league has some control over that. It decides what goes on the court, or what’s digitally superimposed, like the CGI Larry O’Brien trophies on the floor for Game 2.

Getting large audiences for these finals games was already unlikely. A matchup of two small-market franchises set expectations low for ratings. Through three games, they have been the lowest-watched in recent history (COVID-19 seasons excepted). The TV look of the series has caused consternation for some of the fans tuning in.

When the NBA debuted its In-Season Tournament last year, it rolled out a slew of loud, occasionally bombastic, new court designs that were supposed to tell viewers that what they are watching is different and important. Yet, there are no such signifiers for finals games. It is a curious thing when an NBA Cup game is more easily identifiable than one in the finals.

Silver is not oblivious to the complaints. He said the league could reinstall some of the old touches next season.

“I’m nostalgic, as well, for certain things,” he said. “And also, I think for a media-driven culture, whether it’s people watching live or seeing those images on social media, it’s nice when you’re looking back on highlights and they stand out because you see that trophy logo or some other indication that it’s a special event. So, we’ll look at it.”

Silver is not wrong that nostalgia is at play, too. The present day is never really a match for how our favorite sports sit in our minds, forever stuck in the time and year when we fell in love with them. The NBA, no matter how innovative, can’t meet that moment.

Yet, in some ways, the discussion around how the NBA Finals should look is a testament to the league itself. It is a reflection that its fans, and others tuning in, want to see and feel that the game they are watching matches the heft of what it is. A finals game is big, so it should look big, too.