Just five years ago, empty arenas dominated the sports scene. While it’s widely accepted that live fans enhance the experience, Dan Le Batard argues that their presence isn’t essential. On Tuesday’s episode of The Dan Le Batard Show with Stugotz, the crew explored the Unrivaled basketball league’s successful inaugural season. Guest co-host Greg Cote expressed doubts about the league’s growth with its current 850-fan capacity at Miami’s Wayfair Arena, but Le Batard brushed off Cote’s concerns as outdated.
“I will keep saying to you guys that the future of sports doesn’t require fans to be in attendance,” stated the Meadowlark Media co-founder. “And it doesn’t even require fans to be watching on television. It’s just all programming, and the television streamers need the programming. Sports is one of the few areas where viewers tune in at a specific time. There are so few now. What are they?”
Le Batard’s key argument is that television rights deals, particularly in the realm of streaming, have become so substantial that traditional measures like attendance have become less relevant for assessing a league’s financial health. Whether an event draws 850 fans or 85,000 is secondary to what a network is willing to pay to fill its lineup amidst the streaming competition.
However, conditions could shift rapidly. While a league may currently function with modest or unproven ratings, that may not hold true a decade from now. Attendance and ratings may hold less weight on a league’s financial bottom line than they did five years ago — pre-COVID at least — but they still reflect fan interest. Having an appealing product is likely to remain crucial, especially if and when the streaming bubble eventually bursts.
Ultimately, Dan Le Batard’s broader point resonates, particularly concerning made-for-TV products like Unrivaled. Still, we can all agree, let’s avoid a return to arenas filled with cardboard cutouts, which now seem even stranger in retrospect.
