These days, it's common to hear people, even young YouTubers, talk about how the NBA didn't really blow up until the Jordan era. But it's something you would have had to live through to really appreciate. And to give an example, I'd like to point out a phenomenon that was intrinsic to the NBA blowing up, yet all basketball historians tend to overlook. But I know it was important to the propagation of the league, before it really became mainstream, because I was there.
THE CBS YEARS
As a backdrop, yes, there was a time that NBA games were shown only sparingly, in undesirable timeslots on CBS, aka the lowliest of the American major (i.e. antenna) television networks. I literally can't think of a single show I watched on CBS. That channel was so boring that as a teenager, I'd watch PBS, i.e. an educational network, more.
And by the time the 1990s hit, there were only a handful of players with national name recognition, i.e. dudes who you not only knew there names but also how they looked. That would be, really, like Magic, Bird, Kareem, Dr. J and Jordan, as well as a few peripheral dudes, such as maybe Barkley since, you know, he had a real unique look. But in a nutshell, you had to either be a champion or on commercials, like Isaiah Thomas, who wasn't on commercials, but you at least knew his name. It wasn't like today, where every tom-dick-and-harry NBAer at least has a social media account
So those are the parts of the story everyone knows. The Magic vs. Bird rivalry pumped fresh blood into the league, but again, it wasn't enough to get the NBA pass CBS. Basketball was the most-popular sport (alongside American football) in the 'hood, even back in those days. In cramped urban spaces, it ain't like you can setup a hockey rink or soccer pitch. But even though kids had some idea how to play, it wasn't from watching basketball on TV per se.
I remember my big bro trying to teach me to play when I was kid, and I was totally disinterested. This was before the days of Jordan, before the NBA eventually made its way to NBC, and everyone started watching. And as for big bro, he's what I was would call a basketball head. He played on his high school team and was one of those types who would actually like check the TV Guide to see when CBS was broadcasting games, set that time aside and actually watch. He was different from the rest of us.
ENTER EA SPORTS
And now, we're getting to the part of the history that people always overlook, how when things happen that change the world, it's rarely the result of just a single factor. It's hard to become fans of a league when you don't even know who most of the players are. And I'm not talking about just five or six dudes you occasionally see on TV or on a cereal box. That's not going to cut it.
Jordan had mass appeal, and everyone wanted to see him win. We all know that. During the Bulls' first threepeat is when the NBA really started catching on.
Concurrently, there was the first "Dream Team", which helped the game go global. We all know that also.
And concurrently, circa the Bulls' first threepeat, EA Sports started releasing NBA videogames, which were instrumental in popularizing the league. That's the part of the story those who were too young to be there could never appreciate.
And I mean yeah, it's sorta understandable. The NBA Live franchise wasn't even able to maintain dominance for a solid decade. These days, when it comes to basketball videogames, only one name comes to mind - NBA 2K. They may be the superior product, but they weren't the first respectable NBA videogame franchise.
And this is important because, again, we're talking pre-internet. So in those days for instance, the only way you knew every man on a team, 1-12, is if first of all you were a diehard fan, usually of a single squad or two. Then, whatever team was most popular in your area, in the United States, usually would have their boxscores published in the local newspaper, on the nights they played.
Occasionally, I think on Sundays, some newspapers would publish boxscores from around the entire league. Reading boxscores in a newspaper is even more cumbersome, imo, than doing so on the 'net. And since this was pre-internet, readers weren't privy to like season averages and shit like that. And also - this is perhaps the most important point I'm trying to make in context - reading stats doesn't let you know how dudes look, nor how they actually play, like their playing styles. You can see a dude like, say, Clyde Drexler putting up 20+ppg, but you don't know how he got it.
And that's where EA Sports changed everything. The first game they put out was Jordan vs. Bird One on One (1988) which, as its name implies, wasn't a team-basketball outing. But, it was a start. And it's kinda odd, I guess you can say, that even back in 1988, Jordan was already being shown more love (as the Black face of the league) than Magic, who actually won the championship that year, besides winning four prior, while MJ hadn't won any by that point.
Then came the follow-up, Lakers versus Celtics and the NBA Playoffs (1989), which featured 8 teams, full 12-man rosters if I remember correctly, as well as the All-Star squads.
This was then succeeded by Bulls versus Lakers and the NBA Playoffs (1992), which had all 16 posteseason team, i.e. over half the league. And please forgive me if I don't remember everything exactly, but I do recall each team having a full 12-man roster, besides being able to view their season averages and stuff like that. So now, you not only knew the names of most of the guys in the NBA but also their strengths, weaknesses and playing styles.
Granted, these earlier games may not have been the most realistic I remember for instance something like Charles Barkley being able to dunk from the three-point line, and Tom Chambers also having some kind of unstoppable move.
But again, being able to read stats like that at your own convenience really made a difference, and it still does. Just think of EA Sports as the primary NBA stat source before Wikipedia or Basketball-Reference.
Later down the line, EA introduced the NBA Live franchise with (virtually) every team and player being represented. This is the franchise upon which NBA 2K went on to be more or less based, when you look at the similarities in cover art for instance.
So just like you always have to give Jordan credit for introducing basketball to the entire world, even if Lebron is the better player, you also have to give Electronic Arts their props for first making NBA rosters known to general public, even if 2K is better. The homeys played all of those EA Sports games, including Team USA Basketball (1992), and that's how we really got to know the NBA. And it wasn't the same with the NFL videogames because in that league, there's like too many guys to memorize.
CONCLUSION
Looking back at those days, it's hard for me to imagine the NBA catching on the way it did if not for EA Sports. Even during the Jordan years, when the league transitioned to NBC, games were only shown on the weekend, and only those of the most-popular teams. And even then, you know what I'm saying? If you weren't like MJ or Shaq or the Knicks or some shit, no layman was going out of his way to watch you play.
But what laymen were doing was playing those EA Sports' games. And I mean, yeah. Do they even make NBA Live games anymore? Like somebody needs to give these dudes their props, in helping to propagate the league.
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