{"id":108032,"date":"2025-06-18T20:27:13","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T20:27:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/108032\/"},"modified":"2025-06-18T20:27:13","modified_gmt":"2025-06-18T20:27:13","slug":"nba-suffers-major-blow-amid-thunder-pacers-finals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/108032\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA Suffers Major Blow Amid Thunder-Pacers Finals"},"content":{"rendered":"

NBA Suffers Major Blow Amid Thunder-Pacers Finals<\/a> originally appeared on Athlon Sports<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Oklahoma City Thunder hold a 3-2 lead over the Indiana Pacers in the NBA Finals heading into Game 6 on Thursday in Indianapolis at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.<\/p>\n

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The series has been intense at times because both teams traded victories throughout the first four games. However, the Thunder took control of the pace in Game 5 to cruise to a comfortable 120-109 win.<\/p>\n

However, the solid play hasn\u2019t resulted in excellent TV ratings. According to\u00a0television analyst and writer<\/a> Clay Travis, \u201cFewer people are watching the NBA Finals through five games than have watched since before the [Larry Bird] and [Magic Johnson] entered the league.\u201d<\/p>\n

The league has historically had solid ratings since the mid-to-late 1980s, when superstars such as Bird, Johnson and Michael Jordan were among the top players playing in the finals. Furthermore, ratings for Game 6 of the 1993 Finals between the Chicago Bulls and Phoenix Suns were 20.3, and in Game 7 of the 1988 Finals between the Los Angeles Lakers and Detroit Pistons, ratings were as high as 21.2, according to\u00a0sportmediawatch.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, the league did encounter a drop in ratings during the 2020 NBA Finals between the Lakers and Miami Heat because of the COVID-19 pandemic suspending the season until the late summer and early fall which forced the NBA to begin competing with the NFL for ratings.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThe league\u2019s finals ratings, other than Covid year when they played in the fall and competed with the NFL, have never been lower in live air history,\u201d Travis added.<\/p>\n

\"Oklahoma<\/p>\n

Oklahoma City Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (2) brings the ball up court past Indiana Pacers guard Andrew Nembhard (2)\u00a9 Alonzo Adams-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

However, despite Travis\u2019 findings, the ratings could change throughout the rest of the series. Game 6 of the NBA Finals between the Pacers and Thunder will air on ABC at 8:30 p.m. ET from Gainbridge Fieldhouse.<\/p>\n

Related: Pascal Siakam Reveals Honest Thoughts on NBA Journey Amid Finals<\/a><\/p>\n

This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports<\/a> on Jun 18, 2025, where it first appeared.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NBA Suffers Major Blow Amid Thunder-Pacers Finals originally appeared on Athlon Sports. The Oklahoma City Thunder hold a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":108033,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3783],"tags":[1784,7,329,2162,188,7996,126,3497,150,2682,189,935,6,1220,310,475,179,3966,3965,472,209,312,9695],"class_list":{"0":"post-108032","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-oklahoma-city-thunder","8":"tag-andrew-nembhard","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-chicago-bulls","11":"tag-clay-travis","12":"tag-detroit-pistons","13":"tag-gainbridge-fieldhouse","14":"tag-indiana-pacers","15":"tag-larry-bird","16":"tag-los-angeles-lakers","17":"tag-magic-johnson","18":"tag-miami-heat","19":"tag-michael-jordan","20":"tag-nba","21":"tag-nba-finals","22":"tag-oklahoma","23":"tag-oklahoma-city","24":"tag-oklahoma-city-thunder","25":"tag-oklahomacity","26":"tag-oklahomacitythunder","27":"tag-phoenix-suns","28":"tag-shai-gilgeous-alexander","29":"tag-thunder","30":"tag-tv-ratings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114706254913989456","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108032","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108032"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108032\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108033"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}