Random Thoughts: pro seasons, TV money

SCOTT TRUXELL/independent sports editor

This week’s Random Thoughts center around long seasons and TV dollars.

Long pro sports seasons

One of the questions submitted to the latest Monday Mailbag was about shortening the NBA season and the long MLB season.

Many people think pro sports seasons are too long and they’re right. Of course, it all comes down to TV and TV money, so no big changes will come anytime soon.

This is just my opinion, but here’s how pro sports seasons should look:

NFL – Forget the idea of adding two more games to the regular season schedule. Stick with 16 games and start on Labor Day weekend. Keep the existing playoff format but do away with the extra week off between conference championship games and the Super Bowl. The season would still be over in January.

NBA – In reality this probably won’t happen, but reduce the number of regular season games to 70 or 72 and start the regular season in early November, then end it in late March. That’s roughly five months to play 70 or 72 games. Turn the playoffs into a best of five series so the season doesn’t drag into June.

MLB – Start in mid-April and stop scheduling season openers in cold weather cities. There are plenty of places to open the season that make perfect sense – the West Coast, Texas and domed stadiums.

Go to a 150 game schedule and wrap up the regular season by Labor Day weekend. If that involves scheduling a couple of day-night or traditional doubleheaders, so be it. Do away with the wild card playoff game. It’s strictly for television and the extra revenue. Streamline the process so the World Series is done in a reasonable time in October, so players and fans are dodging snowflakes in cold weather cities.

NHL – This won mirrors the NBA in many ways, starting with an 82 game schedule which begins in October and ends in April, which means the Stanley Cup finals are in June. Outside of the most diehard hockey fans, does anyone really want to see hockey in June?

Like the NBA, reduce the schedule, start the regular season later and end it earlier and go to a best of five format. All of that should help reduce wear and tear on the players and should ultimately result in a product that’s just as good as or better than what’s currently offered.

TV controls

As I mentioned before, none of the above proposals will likely happen. There’s too much money at stake, especially television money.

Networks shell out big bucks to air games and they turn to sponsors with deep pockets to cover the cost and (hopefully) turn a profit. Much of the TV money helps fund player salaries.

This isn’t meant to bash television, because it allows millions of people who can’t attend games the ability to still enjoy them.

But in a great sense, TV drives the bus. It’s why NBA finals games and the World Series start at 9 or 9:20 p.m. It’s prime time and it means West Coast viewers won’t be watching games at 5 or 6 p.m. Of course, the later times aren’t friendly to those of us in the Eastern time zone, but that doesn’t seem to matter.

TV is why college football now has so many Saturday night games, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Then again, some of these Saturday night games seem to take four hours or longer, often times running past midnight. Why? Because commercial breaks are added or are longer to squeeze out every last dollar.

Television is also why you see MAC college football games on Tuesdays and Wednesdays in November. It’s nice for those schools to get some TV exposure but it affects attendance in a big way. Just look at the number of people in the stadium.

If ESPN or any other network tells a conference we have a truckload of money to give you but we want you to play at 8 on Tuesday or Wednesday, the general response will be “Fine, 8 a.m. or 8 p.m.?”

TV is why college football and basketball have conference tournaments. Conference champs were determined during the regular season. The tournaments are designed specifically for television revenue.

In the end, it’s all about the money.

As always, if you have thoughts on the above subjects, feel free to email me at sports@thevwindependent.com.