NBA - Main

This seems like a policy change on the NBA's part. I don't think the refs did this on their own, and I don't think the NBA would make a point of doing this if it didn't make a difference to their bottom line somehow.

The thing is that I am not sure how it does. By way of background I will say I have been wanting them to penalize stare downs and mugging for the camera nonsense for a long time. It might add to your enjoyment of the game, it takes away from my enjoyment of it.

I don't think there is inherently anything wrong with players doing this, its just my personal preference. My assumption has always been that I am in the minority on this one, that most people don't care one way or the other about these kinds of celebrations, and that at least as many people like them as dislike them. But now I am not so sure. Perhaps they have some data on viewer preferences that tells them there are people who really don't like it. That would surprise me. I would have thought that everyone who hated the post dunk shenanigans would have stopped watching the NBA long ago. T-ing players up for stare downs and doing their little faux tough guy act after dunks isn't going to bring those people back because they stopped watching. They don't know that this is happening.

But while I find it unlikely that it makes the money, I find it even more unlikely that they would do something like this for any reason other than money. I just can't figure out how it makes them money. I can't believe there are enough people like me who are bothered by this for it to make any kind of real difference. Maybe advertisers are telling them this, but again I have trouble seeing why advertisers would care unless they have data saying that people are tuning out because of post dunk celebrations.