ELItorial

The NBA shoots another airball

Admittedly, it's still early. And with the Florida hullabullo, who has time to check out NBA games anyway? But the political mess hasn't seemed to drive NFL fans away. That league, in the midst of an attendance record-breaking season, saw all 15 NFL games sell out in advance of the local blackout deadline this weekend for only the second time in the 27-year history of the television policy.

MARK SEROTA/NEWSMAKERS Filmmaker and Knicks devotee Spike Lee is able to afford NBA tickets, but an average fan can't.

The NBA has yet to release official numbers on attendance for the first few weeks of the season, so it would be pure speculation to guess that numbers are down. Rather, the problem seems both more widespread and more commonplace. Can you name the best team in the NBA? How about the worst? Scoring leaders? Who's hot, who's not? I sure as hell can't. And why? Because I just stopped caring.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that over the past few seasons the Knicks traded away the heart and soul of the team I grew up watching. No more Oakley, no more Ewing. Or perhaps because free agency and enormous contracts have players moving around the league so quickly that I have to remind myself that Grant Hill isn't a Piston anymore and that Jamal Mashburn is a Hornet. But blockbuster trades and contracts also plague football and baseball—and yet the fact that the Mets roster come April 2001 may scarcely resemble the team I saw lose to the Yanks a few weeks ago doesn't faze me quite as much.

Perhaps that's because as a Mets fan, I know that if I wanna see the Amazin's in action, I can head out to Shea, where for $12 I can catch the game, albeit from the upper deck. At school, I can tune into local television as nearly half the Mets season is broadcast on non-cable (i.e. free) channels. Come fall, I'm always looking to follow the Giants and the NFL. While I probably couldn't get a seat at Giants Stadium if my life depended on it, every single game is broadcast on local stations. When the Giants play the Sunday night game on ESPN, the NFL requires ESPN to provide a free feed to a local station so that fans who don't have cable won't have to miss a game.

Now let's say I wanted to check out the Knicks. Madison Square Garden is thrilled to inform me that there are a "limited number of select seats" priced at the bargain- basement value of $37.50. Never mind that you'll probably be able to swing from Bill Bradley's retired jersey while you're up there, or that you'd probably have to fight off half of New York to get one of those tickets. And if you want an average seat in the middle of the arena it'll only cost you $195 (you don't want to know how much you'd have to drop for a seat on the floor). The high prices are not just one of those "perks" of living in New York either. The NBA has the highest average-ticket cost of any of the major athletic leagues, and this season it became the first league whose average ticket price topped $50.

More importantly, of the eight Knicks games to date, how many have been broadcast free of charge to fans? Not a single one. And over the course of New York's 82-game schedule, only 10 measly games will be available to those without cable, as part of NBC's Sunday NBA coverage. Lucky for me, the good folks at NBC deem the Knicks a team worth carrying. If I had the misfortune of being a Clippers fan, I wouldn't get to see my team play on broadcast television even once this year.

So if I want to follow the Knicks, I either have to lay down an exorbitant amount of money to see them play in person or I have to be willing to pay for cable. With the NFL and Major League Baseball providing plenty of drama free of charge almost all year long, why on earth should I bother? What's more, if I do choose to pay to attend a game at Shea or Giants Stadium, chances are a lot lower that I'll have to spend it sitting next to some jackass in a $10,000 suit whose knowledge of the game extends to understanding that his date will be wildly impressed by his ability to land tickets to it.

I'm sick and tired of the NBA's arrogance. If they want to charge me an arm and a leg to see a game in person, that's one thing. But not letting me even check out my team on TV free of charge is another. As a result, I've stopped watching and I've certainly stopped caring. Let NBA arenas fill up with Armani suits. They're both equally empty where it counts.

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