{"id":696749,"date":"2026-04-03T23:05:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T23:05:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/696749\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T23:05:17","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T23:05:17","slug":"study-star-players-sit-out-majority-of-nba-national-tv-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/696749\/","title":{"rendered":"Study: Star Players Sit Out Majority Of NBA National TV Games"},"content":{"rendered":"

The NBA has a participation problem…<\/p>\n

PublishedApril 3, 2026 4:40 PM EDT\u2022UpdatedApril 3, 2026 4:40 PM EDT<\/p>\n

FacebookTwitterEmailCopy Link<\/p>\n

Various metrics suggest the NBA has slipped below both MLB and college basketball<\/a> in popularity. One reason for the league\u2019s decline is the frequency with which star players sit out nationally televised games.<\/p>\n

This week, Yahoo columnist Tom Haberstroh examined how many star players<\/a> have missed TV games this season. He defined a “star player” as someone with an All-NBA or All-Star appearance in one of the last three seasons. Using that definition, he found that just 32.7 percent of nationally televised games featured a full complement of star players.<\/p>\n

“Said another way: About two out of three national TV games will have at least one star player in street clothes,” he explained.<\/p>\n

Haberstroh also broke down star participation by network, suggesting that players are more likely to play through so-called injuries on ABC than on Peacock.<\/p>\n

“According to the Yahoo Sports study, in nine of the exclusively Peacock non-NBC games with stars on both sides, only one featured all the stars, a full-star percentage of 11 percent. But for ABC games, which are on Disney\u2019s biggest network platform, the full-star percentage checked in at 43 percent, more than triple that of Peacock. ABC\u2019s full-star percentage was the highest of the channels,” Haberstroh reported.<\/p>\n

\"Los<\/p>\n

Los Angeles Lakers’ LeBron James shoots a three over Clippers All-Star Kawhi Leonard at Crypto.com Arena.\u00a0<\/p>\n

(Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports)<\/p>\n

Awful Announcing added in a follow-up report<\/a> that only one of the NBA\u2019s top 25 scorers this season has played in every game: Minnesota Timberwolves forward Julius Randle. Only four others have even crossed the 70-game mark: Kevin Durant, Jamal Murray, Jalen Brunson, and Brandon Ingram.<\/p>\n

Worse, teams often wait until shootaround to announce the absence of star players, long after fans have already purchased tickets. In the process, the NBA has effectively disincentivized buying tickets early.<\/p>\n

This trend comes as the NBA asks fans to pay more to watch regular-season games. Under the league\u2019s new 11-year broadcast agreements, games now air on ESPN, NBC, Peacock, and Amazon Prime, with the latter two requiring paid monthly subscriptions in addition to cable.<\/p>\n

Injuries are unavoidable in any sport. But there is a difference between legitimate injury and choosing to rest for minor aches because the game carries little importance.<\/p>\n

\"Luka<\/p>\n

(Luka Doncic of the Los Angeles Lakers. Photo by Harry How\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

According to Haberstroh, star availability has dropped from about 80 percent last season to around 60 percent this year.<\/p>\n

“Chances are, if you want to watch the big game, and you actually want to see all the stars playing, you won\u2019t be in luck,” he added.<\/p>\n

The NBA does not have an injury problem. It has a participation problem. Players do not value the regular season because 20 teams now reach postseason play through the Play-in Tournament. Further, rest is more of a competitive advantage than seeding entering the playoffs.<\/p>\n

Put bluntly, the NBA is asking fans to pay to watch games, in person and at home, that star players do not consider important enough to play.<\/p>\n

And fans have responded by watching and attending less, while other sports organizations thrive.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The NBA has a participation problem… PublishedApril 3, 2026 4:40 PM EDT\u2022UpdatedApril 3, 2026 4:40 PM EDT FacebookTwitterEmailCopy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":696750,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3789],"tags":[7,559,4034,192,4032,251,135,4033,4031,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-696749","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles-clippers","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-clippers","10":"tag-la","11":"tag-la-clippers","12":"tag-laclippers","13":"tag-los-angeles","14":"tag-los-angeles-clippers","15":"tag-losangeles","16":"tag-losangelesclippers","17":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116343285524671906","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696749","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=696749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/696749\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/696750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=696749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=696749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=696749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}