Since as long as I've known Jordan Makin, he's maintained that big market superstars get more calls than small market normal players.
Based on the #nbaplayoff visualization below, it's clear that all-stars do draw more fouls on the whole, yet it doesn't seem to correlate to the team's market size or win-loss record.
ESPN might be done for. The pro leagues have realized they don't need them as middle man for relationships with fans. Leagues want direct. NBA, NFL, don't need to share their content with ESPN anymore to find audiences. And all that ad revenue can be theirs. It can't be long until colleges and NCAA realize they can reach their more targeted, long tail audiences through direct channels for sports.
After this last round of layoffs, ESPN said is trying to make Sportscenter and games more digitally present. I can’t think of a way for that to happen without an OTT ESPN option.
I took two of the networks that added OTT options recently, HBO and CBS, and added ESPN’s current sub trend to come up with this. If HBO numbers are indication, OTT won’t reverse the course of ESPN, but it will stop the bleeding. Plus, the implications of ESPN going OTT will likely catalyze the fall of cable house of cards. Could be more upside if cable TV crashes.
Come on ESPN, offer a direct monthly subscription!
Here is a look at how incentivized the NBA, it's partners and teams, and advertising money is to try and extend series to 7 games.
My takeaway: 7 games series are more common when they are more lucrative. But because each round increases the likelihood of parity between the teams, financial incentive can hardly indict the NBA in pushing series to 7 through officiating.
Yet the incentive is there, and for 24.2 Million dollars, its hard not to think there is some systematic pressure to extend. Interesting to think about.
I wanted to explore the relationship between NBA media market size and overall playoff success.
There has long been a trope that big market teams get more talent because of their fiscal advantage over small market teams, and that NBA favors big market teams because of that fiscal incentive.
Based on these visualizations, this is just not true. In fact, I think these make a good argument that small market teams actually do slightly better on the whole than their big market counterparts.
I wanted to break down NBA success by region.
The traditional way of seeing teams successes was based solely on players would explain playoff success. But does that city as a market have an appeal that draws the superstars? Do small market teams compete as often as large market teams? Does the media money from the bigger cities increase chances of post-season success?
I came up with a system for figuring out which sessions are most interesting. The model functions by assuming the lower the session scored in points, the more likely that session was to be interesting.
No surprise that Sunday Afternoon session is the most boring. It was a surprise that Priesthood and Women’s Conf are the most interesting. I think the women's session benefits greatly from audio visual media, something I hope to see more of in other sessions.
A visualization on Utah voting trends. I took Utah gubernatorial and all US Senate, House, and Presidential election results and came up with an average for both major parties.
(Most Interesting to me is that both parties are down this cycle. Party delineation, perhaps?)
I expanded my basketball visualization to include BYU, Utah, USU, WSU, and UVU. Here are the respective team charts and a companion graph with all teams. In the last decade, there has been a lot of parity in the Wasatch Front.
Interesting to see the exponential rise in Breath of the Wild.
