As with almost all professional sports, NBA basketball was curtailed by COVID-19 and the league suspended between 11th March and 30th June. Upon resumption 22 of the 30 teams headed to Walt Disney World, Orlando to be part of “the bubble” in order to conclude the regular season, playins, playoffs and finals.
SSA visit to San Antonio Spurs practice prior to the NBA suspension
Similar to most sports, the NBA bubble has required matches to be played behind closed doors. The major difference between the NBA and European Football, for example, has been its centralised format. Athletes, coaches, officials and support staff were required to come together in one biosecure facility. Players have been allowed to leave, particularly for personal reasons, but upon returning have been required to take multiple tests and quarantine before rejoining teammates for training or games.
The facility in Orlando, in essence, has become a huge neutral venue. By their very nature, neutral venues seek to negate any performance benefit gained through the phenomena of home advantage. This is of particular interest in the NBA, where the format of the playoffs unapologetically incorporates a supposed home-court advantage into every series based on each team’s regular season ranking.
Since lockdown and with games taking place behind closed doors, the research world has been interested to see how the absence of fans might impact home advantage. Fan support and intimidatory behaviour towards away players is often cited when trying to explain the benefit. These are not the only areas of interest. The familiarity of venue and travel/fatigue also feature highly when attempting to understand why and how home-court advantage exists in the NBA.
The bubble immediately removes any familiarity advantage that could have existed, travel reasons are also nullified. Interestingly, data since a 2010 paper highlighting potential disadvantages linked to travel and time zone changes suggests teams are now adjusting their preparations accordingly and the disadvantages linked with travel have disappeared.
With the 2019/2020 European football season now finished, early review papers are being published examining if and how home advantage was influenced by fans absence. An early report, produced by the economics department at the University of Reading, found, after some initial increases in away wins, data began to even out and no significant shift in results was found without crowds. However, what they did find, in line with previous research, and highlighted in a previous SSA blog, was that the number of yellow cards brandished to away sides decreased without the presence of partisan home support.
In basketball, the impact of referee calls or non-calls are perhaps more integral to the game, its tactics and therefore outcome compared with football. The personal foul limit (six personal fouls in the NBA results in a player being ‘fouled out’ and unable to take part in the remainder of the game) will often influence coaches’ decisions in terms of player minutes and defensive assignments. If primary or secondary scorers, leading defensive players or major rebounders get called for early fouls, a coach could be forced to adjust the player’s role at both ends of the floor potentially inhibiting the team’s ability to score, or make defensive stops. Worse still, the accumulation of team fouls will lead directly to free throws and additional easy scoring opportunities.
If previously, away team players were more likely to have fouls called against them (and there is some data to support this), then in the bubble, because of a lack of crowd influence, the calls should even out. Even if it is only fractional, one less foul called on a team's franchise player could give them more licence to play, score and be aggressive at both ends of the court. Fewer calls across the team could reduce free throw calls and directly impact scoring opportunities.
So what does this mean for marketers?
Knowing that any home-court advantage can potentially be removed, the lower-ranked teams can enter each round of the playoffs with increased optimism. Franchises can work with partners allowing them to drive increased optimism. Fans of 7th or an 8th seeded teams understand their odds of victory are still long. But often fans will cling to anything, including the insight that home court will be worth less and to watch for calls/non-calls against their heroes as a sign it could just be their night.
Modern fans crave more than just statistics and highlights reels, they are looking for a deeper understanding of performance and its drivers. If sponsors want to become relevant to fans they have to offer a fair value exchange. This could be in terms of promotions, giveaways or competitions, but by far the easiest, cheapest and maybe even most valuable is performance insight. Giving fans access to performance information that has traditionally only been available to club staff makes them better fans and brings them closer to the franchise.
Fans have been locked out of live sport for a long time and a return to capacity crowds still feels some way off. For sponsors and brands that have lost the ability to showcase their support via the traditional game-day activity the shift to digital is the only option. But how do you grab the attention of fans in an increasingly crowded online market? Value, value, value. Become the conduit to the players and franchises performance story and the rewards can be exceptional.
Sport Science Agency uses its insight and expertise to tell performance stories and unlocks their value for brands, broadcasters and rights holders. If you want to know more about what we can do for you, drop us a note via info@sportscienceagency.com and we can arrange to go for a healthy vitamin packed drink.