This week, the 2016 NBA season begins with 28 teams trying to figure out how to defeat the Cleveland Cavaliers and Golden State Warriors, who are the favorites to win the title this year. While plenty of people will be making their picks next Thursday or their NFL picks on Sunday, one major question some people have been asking is will the NBA ever catch up to the NFL?
Right now, some people might think it’s a silly question because the NFL is the undisputed king in the United States. However, there is some validity to the question.
The NBA has some of the most popular stars in the world, which has made basketball one of the most popular sports globally. The NFL, on the other hand, might be more popular in the United States, but their players aren’t as well known world wide as basketball players.
The NBA is a more global sport than the NFL, which is still a niche sport in the global marketplace.
Visibility is another issue that favors the NBA over the NFL. In the NBA, players don’t wear masks to protect their heads, so their faces are more easily recognizable. In the NFL, unless a player is a top star playing one of a select few positions, they mostly go unrecognized due to the helmets that they wear.
Another knock against the NFL is the injury concern. Players put their bodies through a lot in the NFL, and by the time they retire, most players are dealing with the effects of CTE and other ailments caused by the punishment they took during their careers.
Parents are now wary about their children playing football because of the injuries, and are steering their kids towards safer sports like basketball and baseball.
Basketball, with so many kids all over the world involved in playing it, is now as popular as it’s ever been. In the NFL, the fact that the league has been dealing with a lot of public relations issues like domestic violence, coupled with so many ugly prime time games that have occurred in recent years, has preceded a decline in ratings.
This season, the NFL is dealing with a 25 percent drop in ratings from a year ago, which is proving a theory that the sport is in decline. The decline in ratings and the fact that the NBA is picking up more fans around the world, means that it is only a matter of time before the NBA catches up to the NFL in terms of popularity in the United States.
The NFL also has a problem at the quarterback position, the premier player job in the league. That will surely have an effect on future ratings. The guys who have been the quarterbacks in the league the past decade or so are now all at the tail end of their careers, which means they will be retiring in the next couple of years.
Players like Tom Brady, Ben Roethlisberger, Drew Brees, and Aaron Rodgers will soon join Peyton Manning in retirement, and when they do, there will be a big void because there aren’t many quarterbacks playing right now that can fill the void left by these future Hall of Famers.
The NBA is also catching up on the NFL in terms of revenue. This year, the NBA is expecting a revenue of $8 billion, compared to the NFL’s $13 billion, so it’s only a matter of time before it overtakes the NFL.