Saturday Night Special

Anyone who has followed my work over the past few years knows that I can be quite the conspiracy theorist. Whether it be in the form of a column, elaborate magazine piece or live on the air one thing I don’t short my followers on is helpful information that could and should raise eyebrows within the sports community. Now I have new hypothesis which is dripping with the hint of an underlined scheme or hidden agenda all over it and of course it comes from my favorite professional league to hitch these private plans along to; David Stern’s National Basketball Association.

It’s no secret to anyone that the New York sports market is by far the most influential and power of them all within the United States. New York City area professional sports teams draw some of the most attention across all four of the major sports leagues and this stems from the machine which is the New York area media and its fans more so than the actual play on field or court of these nine franchise who have been blessed with a golden ball (or puck) to compete with during their contests.

It’s also no secret that for nearly a decade the play of one of those nine teams (and possibly the second most important to NYC sports fans), the New York Knicks have engaged in the levels of futility that could only be rivaled by someone attempting to hit a six-inch, moving piñata in complete darkness with a two-inch stick. Over the past two seasons the Knicks have turned things around (in large part thanks to a man who is no longer on the team payroll, Donnie Walsh) and begun to place themselves back to a respectable level of relevance in the win column and not just the bottom line chart.

With the Knicks ascending back from the depths of the Association’s basement and their fans reaching new levels of obnoxious and putrid behavior it’s only right that one of sports’ shrewdest businessmen act out on a plan to wet his beak along with James “the Cableman” Dolan.  And that is exactly what Dictator Stern is doing; exploiting these Knickerbockers at every opportunity he can and putting up a masquerade that it is for the good of the league.

When the Knicks are relevant the Association sees a boost in everything from television ratings to apparel being sold. This is clearly evident once one focuses on the decade of the 1990’s when the Knicks were reaching the postseason on a yearly basis and the NBA had an opening to jump both the almighty National Football League and Major League Baseball in American popularity. Many place the decline of the Association’s esteem within the great 50 states on the retirement of Michael Jordan, which I for one will not dispute however I also feel that the deterioration of the Knicks as an organization had something to do with it as well. I digress and that’s an article for another day so let’s get back to the matter at hand.

Dictator Stern needs, wants and salivates at the possibility to keep the Knicks around as long as possible during the postseason and this fact can be clearly seen within the NBA’s scheduling of the postseason games this year. Saturday May 15 will mark the third time this postseason that the Knicks will be competing under the bright lights of the weekend’s most illustrious day.

Game one of the Knicks first round playoff series with the Boston Celtics aired at 3:00pm on Saturday April 20 and received 4.4 million viewers according to the Neilsen ratings. That in itself is remarkable to think that an NBA playoff game could keep 4,400,000 people in their homes, glued to their television on a Saturday afternoon that saw most of the country enjoying optimal temperatures for a spring day between 60-80 degrees. That’s pretty powerful, huh?

The Association then scheduled a full slate of games for the following Saturday, however the ratings didn’t come close to that of which the Knicks pulled out just seven days prior. The NBA received a great boost again from the city of New York on Saturday May 4 as Brooklyn was the center of the sports world having the only postseason game played that day. The Knicks cross-city rivals, the Brooklyn Nets squared off against the Chicago Bulls in the borough’s first game seven since 1956. That rough and tumble battle which eventually saw the Bulls emerging victorious also drew 4.4 million viewers according to the Neilsen ratings but the game was televised on TNT and not ABC as was the Knicks opening game versus the Celtics on April 20 along with their second round, game three match up versus the Indiana Pacers on Saturday May 11 and game six on Saturday May 18.

The bottom line is this just in case if you haven’t been paying attention; Dictator Stern and his Association “prefers” to have the Knicks play postseason games airing on ABC during Saturday’s in the spring. Now I’m not going to go as far to state that the reason the Knicks slithered by the Pacers in game five was to set up a game six on a Saturday but…………………….., hey I’ll let you fill in the blanks if the shoe fits and it cost the right price.