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Mike Reynolds
With Michael Jordan's retirement from the NBA, one of the key questions remains is how much Air will be taken out of the TV ratings on Turner Sports during the abbreviated season that tips on Feb. 5.
Clearly, His Airness' exit from the game certainly can't help the NBA as it tries to regain fan/viewer interest following its debilitating lockout. However, if past is prologue, the impact on TBS and TNT may not be as great as one would first imagine when considering that the cultural icon and basketball's all-time greatest player won't be lacing his Air Jordans up on the court anymore.
Last season, Jordan and his Chicago Bulls averaged a 2.8 rating on the cable networks, 65% above the channels' 1.7 average during the regular season. However, during the 1993-94 season-the time when Jordan first left hoops and pursued a baseball dream-Bulls games averaged a 2.1, 24% above the 1.7 average the two networks netted for that campaign.
Given the Bulls' history of first-round sweeps and national broadcast carrier NBC's rights to latter-round games, the impact on Turner's playoff ratings have not been that great, according to a Turner Sports spokesman.
How many times the Bulls, minus No. 23, will appear on Turner's, er, air this season was unclear at press time. Under the new four-year $890 million contract Turner signed in November 1997, the maximum number of appearances by one team was 15, and every team had to be televised once every two years (under the former contract, each team had to be on-screen every season). However, at press time, the Turner Sports spokesman said that maximum exposures and policy regarding showcasing each team had not been determined for this truncated season.
Turner is expected to show somewhere between 40-45 regular season contests. Sports industry sources indicate that the NBA schedule and TV component could possibly be announced late this week or more likely during the final week of January. The latter would seem to be preferable for Turner and NBC in that the networks would have a chance to gauge how free-agent signings will shape clubs' prospects.
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