With LeBron James and Stephen Curry nearing retirement, the league has no clear next brand ambassador. Changing media landscapes and a new focus on team parity haven’t helped.
If you tuned into the thrilling Game 1 of the N.B.A. Finals on Thursday night, you may have found yourself wondering:
Who are these guys?
There’s no LeBron James, no Stephen Curry. No Lakers, no Knicks, nor even any Celtics. Neither of the teams — the Indiana Pacers or the Oklahoma City Thunder — had been in the N.B.A. finals for more than a decade. To the average sports fan, their rosters are largely unknown.
“I’m not sure I completely buy into the premise of your question,” said Adam Silver, the N.B.A. commissioner, when asked about a finals with limited star power. “I think Shai is an enormous star.”
He was referring to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who won the N.B.A.’s Most Valuable Player Award this year after leading the league in scoring and helping drive the Thunder to 68 wins, the most in franchise history. Silver also mentioned Tyrese Haliburton, the Pacer’s guard with a penchant for late-game heroics.
But even Silver acknowledged those players are lesser known outside basketball fandom than the league’s biggest stars. In some ways, that’s a product of what the league wants — for all of its teams, no matter how small the market, to have a chance at making the finals. But that change also conflicts with one of its major tenets — that star power sells.
Stars have fueled the N.B.A. since the 1980s. Larry Bird and Magic Johnson drove its stampede into the popular consciousness, and then Michael Jordan globalized the game. Stars drive viewership and interest, which in turn drive up the price of media rights deals, cash from sponsors, ticket sales and team valuations.
For the past decade, the league’s ecosystem has revolved around James and Curry. James is now 40 years old, and Curry is 37. The question of who will be the next face of the league, once those two have retired, has hung over the sport for years.