Adam Silver addressed the media prior to Saturday’s All-Star festivities. Some highlights …
On the Luka Doncic trade: “I was surprised when I heard about the trade. I did not know that Luka was potentially a player that was about to be traded. That was news to me. I followed it like a fan from that standpoint. … In terms of anger in the fanbase, I’m empathetic. I understand it. …
“Whether or not history will ultimately judge this as a smart trade, the Mavericks did what they thought was in the best interest of their organization. I have absolutely no knowledge or belief there were any ulterior motives. There’s no doubt in my mind that the Dumont and Adelson families bought that team to keep it in Dallas. I have no doubt whatsoever that they’re committed to the long-term success of that franchise.”
On criticism about the amount of 3-pointers in the game: “I was listening to Steve Kerr interviewed by Bob Costas. I actually was eagerly awaiting his response on the state of 3-point shooting in this league. He was one of the all-time great 3-point shooters when he played, and, if anything, the 3-point revolution was led by the Golden State Warriors and Stephen Curry. His reaction was: ‘Do I think there’s too much 3-point shooting? Possibly, yes. Do I think the state of the game is great? Also yes. Is there a fix that comes to mind that would improve the game and potentially reduce the amount of 3-point shooting?’ There wasn’t one that he had to suggest. …
“One of the things we pay a lot of attention to at the league and through the Competition Committee is: To the extent we have more 3-point shooting, where are those shots coming from? They are not coming from under the basket. Roughly 50% of the points are still scored in that area. So what you’re seeing is a conversion from 2-pointers to 3-pointers, and often those longer shots do take more skill. …
“A long way of saying we’re paying a lot of attention to it. I’m never going to say there isn’t room for improvement. We’ll continue to look at it and study it, but I am happy with the state of the game right now.”
On TV ratings: “It’s almost more media these days instead of TV ratings. But I’ll begin with the state of our ratings right now as they are conventionally measured. They’re slightly down from last season. We had some weakness early in the season. We rebounded, and ratings are heading up right now. So I see that as very positive. And I will say, that’s compared to last year’s regular season, which were our highest ratings in four years. I actually think what was a somewhat negative story early in the season has now turned into a positive and trending upward.
“Having said that, we don’t just look exclusively at traditional TV ratings. One of the things we look a lot at is: How do you measure engagement? Engagement can be measured in many different ways. One is attendance. We came off last season the highest-recorded attendance in the history of the entire league. I look at engagement through social media, and many different platforms, expanding number of platforms all the time. From that standpoint, record popularity. …
“People are using screens more than ever, but there’s only so much time in the day. So if you’re on X or if you’re on Facebook or you’re on Instagram, whatever else, or on Reels, that’s time you might have otherwise been watching television. I think it’s incumbent on us then to reach our fans wherever they are. That kind of engagement is really important to us, as well. …
“I actually think it’s additive. I think we have a much better chance of moving young fans, in particular, to live games if they become engaged with various forms of our content, whether it’s things that our players are doing off the floor, music they love, fashion, or highlights.nBut I think what the challenge for the league is then, how do we move those viewers, those fans to live games? I think part of it is by being smarter in the way we go about creating a lot of that content.”
On the drama surrounding the Jimmy Butler trade and whether we will see more of it under the new collective bargaining agreement: “I’m not concerned that that will be the result of the new CBA. I actually think that what the CBA was designed to do, honestly, is to force teams to make difficult decisions. I think teams are still finding their way a bit through this new second apron and what it means. But for us it’s no secret that part of the design of that CBA and pushing down high-end spending was to create more parity in the league and to do a better job distributing our best players around the 30 teams. I think you’re seeing that to a certain extent already.
I’ll note, and I think new CBAs are always difficult to predict, I think it was only a few months ago when the conventional wisdom around the league seemed to be that we sort of spoiled the excitement around the trade deadline. That the day and age of these great trades at the deadline weren’t going to happen anymore. I think we just saw more players moved before the trade deadline than anytime in the history of the league.”
On the rescinded Mark Williams trade: “Charlotte has not filed a protest of any kind.”
