THE NBA HAS A PERFECT PACE WITH 48 MINUTES — WHY SHORTEN IT, ADAM SILVER?
The commissioner should be addressing anger issues with Victor Wembanyama and, of course, too much three-point shooting — but he’s strangely focused on reducing four quarters to 10 minutes apiece
The NBA commissioner should retire in glory. Adam Silver negotiated $76 billion in media contracts that extend 11 years. Is his reign over? He doesn’t need to think like a broadcast executive and might start pondering Victor Wembanyama, who was irate — yes, we see anger in his French bloodstream — when he stormed after Ivica Zubac and was held back Wednesday night.
“No,” Wemby said when asked if he is treated fairly by officials. “For me, it doesn't feel like it's something I should influence. I'm a player, I'm here to play, and yeah, this is why it's frustrating. It's not my job to do politics.”
Welcome to America. And welcome to our style of pro basketball, where 48 minutes — two hours and 16 minutes in real time — is the perfect way to contest a sports event. It’s hard to believe Silver can’t find anything else wrong with a game that festers too many three-pointers and involves too many idiots like Jimmy Butler demanding trades. But he has decided that abbreviating a game to 40 minutes makes more sense.
Whoa. Is he the first league boss to have a drug problem instead of investigating one? Is Silver’s plan designed to pacify superstars and make them play longer in games when, oh, Michael Jordan played all 82 regular-season games nine times? Does Silver not realize a stream of asterisks would be required for all-time point totals — Wilt Chamberlain’s 100, Kobe Bryant’s 81? That LeBron James’ scoring record would be permanently shelved? Why mess with tradition so Joel Embiid gets off his butt?
Shorten the time frame, he says. He’s screwing with tradition and history.
“As we get more involved in global basketball, the NBA is the only league that plays 48 minutes. And I would be — I am — a fan of four 10-minute quarters. One of the things we'd like to see over time is creating a more consistent set of rules globally around the game,” Silver said on Dan Patrick’s show. “I'm not sure that many others are. It’s such a dramatic change to the game. Putting aside what it means for records and things like that, yeah, I think a two-hour format for a game is more consistent with modern television habits.”
Wait, he already has pulled in the $76 billion. Why even bother with TV? Take a cruise. “I think of a television program being two hours, Olympic basketball being two hours. And college basketball, of course, is 40 minutes,” Silver said. “The Olympic basketball — the U.S.-Serbia, U.S.-France — those are basketball fans saying those are two of the best games they ever saw. Incidentally, if you went to a 40-minute game with the issues around load management and resting, it would be the equivalent of, I don’t know the exact math, taking like 15 games off the season.
“I don’t think most fans would be disappointed if it was a two-hour presentation instead of, you know, our game is actually about two hours and 15 minutes.”
Why not tie two sneakers together with one pair of laces?
What?
Cheech and Chong were stoned when they sang “Basketball Jones.” George Harrison played guitar as they captured the euphoria of Tyrone Shoelaces, who said, “Bill Russell, sing along with us. Chick Hearn, sing along with us. Chris Schenkel, don’t sing nothin’.” It was intended as humor and shows a young man’s excessive love of the sport.
But nothing better exemplifies the spirit of 48 minutes. Fortunately, league coaches are weighing in and opposing Silver.
“I hope we don't become Barnum & Bailey, or do whatever we have to do to keep viewership,” Denver’s Michael Malone said. “Because there's a greatness and a history to this game, and a purity to this game that I hope we can find a way to stay true to.”
“I’m probably more traditional so I’d hate to see that,” New York’s Tom Thibodeau said. “I really haven’t thought about it just because of all the records and things of that nature. I think we have a great game. I think what the fans enjoy is great competition. I think if we focus on the competition aspect of it, everything else will fall into place."
Baseball continues to bog, even with a pitch clock, and could shorten to seven innings as a savior device. Don’t touch the NFL. Don’t touch the NBA. I would be concerned about Wembanyama, with Mitch Johnson commenting as San Antonio’s acting head coach: “It's probably surprising he hasn't reacted like that earlier, to be honest. He gets a lot of contact, and at some point he's going to have to continue to protect himself if the people controlling the game, supposedly, are not going to do that.”
Said Zubac: “I saw Wemby crashing, so I knew I had to box him out. I bumped him a little harder. I let emotions take over a little bit, but I apologized to him. That's not the way I want to be on the court and compete.”
Protect the 7-4, 235-pound face of the young game. That’s a commissioner’s job. Silver does monitor discussions about three-pointers and is coming around, saying, “Fair to be critical of it at times, too, and you know should there be less three-point shooting? I mean that’s something we’re very focused on.”
But 10-minute quarters?
“I think,” he said, “something like that would have to be talked about over time.”
Say, in a future world.
###
Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.