MIKE BURKE

Allegany Communications Sports

Not so long ago – actually, it was quite a few years ago – the NBA Finals was No. 3 on the appointment-viewing list for sports fans behind only the Super Bowl and the World Series. The NHL has always had the most famous trophy in sports, but the Stanley Cup Finals usually came in a distant No. 4.behind the NBA.

Until Larry Bird and Magic Johnson came along in 1979, the NBA also had March Madness beat, even though in the early years of Bird and Magic in the NBA most of the playoffs and the finals were on tape-delay, if you can believe that; but, of course, those two icons would soon change things again and pro and college basketball have lived happily ever after since.

Of course, we’re going back to the day when there weren’t 100 teams (actually 30) in the NBA, when the Boston Celtics and/or the Los Angeles Lakers usually found their way into the championship round, with the Philadelphia 76ers and the New York Knicks slipping in there a handful of times themselves. Then that whole Michael Jordan and Chicago Bulls thing happened and, of course, the basketball season didn’t last until after school was out.

Don’t misunderstand, this isn’t an old-guy rant about how winter-sport basketball used to end in the winter months back in the good old days. Not at all. Between the NBA, college, international and now the explosion of the WNBA, basketball has long been a global sport and a year-round sport, and there’s no problem here with that – the more options, the better.

Which brings us to this year’s NBA Finals, which begin Thursday night and could last as long as June 22 should the series go seven games.

No defending champion Boston this year, no L.A. and LeBron, no Steph and Golden State, and no New York, though the Knicks gave it a heckuva run, then inexplicably fired their coach … So Knicks.

Nope, this year in the final, it’s the indiana Pacers and the favored Oklahoma City Thunder, representing the Nos. 25 and 47 media markets in the country respectively, which, no doubt, has NBA Commissioner Adam Silver weeping in his spaceship, not to mention all of the rich owners who are in line to take a financial hit with two mid-market teams playing in the league’s biggest event of the year.

But not so fast.

Certainly, the NBA would have benefited from a Finals matchup that featured a New York and/or Los Angeles, for instance, but the drop in revenue it will experience in having two of its smallest-market teams on its biggest stage is likely smaller than you think.

Naturally, television ratings play a hand long-term, as do merchandise sales and ticket revenue among other factors. The NBA will make less money in merchandise sales with these teams as opposed to the Knicks, Celtics, Lakers or Warriors, and the price of tickets in the Indiana-Oklahoma City markets compared to the New York or L.A. markets are two entirely different animals.

But cry not for the NBA. Television ratings really have no impact on the NBA’s immediate profit margin, because that profit margin has already been established, as the league signed its current television deal in 2014 and what it receives this season is a fixed payment.

What the NBA receives next season, regardless of how many television sets and devices are on these Finals, is already settled as well, because the league signed its upcoming 11-year media rights deals with NBC, ESPN and Amazon, for a total of $75 billion, last summer.

That’s not going to change if these Finals flop, which, of course, none of the owners want to happen. Same with Disney, who owns ABC, which will televise every game, because the longer the series runs, the more money the league and the network make through marketing. Every game over four will make the players, through their revenue-sharing plan, more money as well, with ABC standing to make the most.

So the only thing the commissioner, the owners and the network don’t want to see is a short series, which, as it turns out, many of the pundits are saying will happen in favor of stacked Oklahoma City.

I have no dog in the hunt, but am particular to Pacers coach Rick Carlisle from his days with the Celtics and from my days as a staunch supporter of every Atlantic Coast Conference school not named Duke or North Carolina.

Methinks it will be a better NBA Finals than most people suspect.

Mike Burke writes about sports and other stuff for Allegany Communications. He began covering sports for the Prince George’s Sentinel in 1981 and joined the Cumberland Times-News sports staff in 1984, serving as sports editor for over 30 years. Contact him at [email protected]. Follow him on X @MikeBurkeMDT