YOU BEEN BLINDED

The NBA Is Too Entertaining For China

David Stern is on a mission to make the NBA a global league, and he gave us a glimpse of his European expansion plans earlier this year. In 2007 the league appointed Timothy Chen, the former head of Microsoft’s China division, to oversee NBA China. Although the Chinese market represents the fastest growing group of NBA fans, the broadcast of playoff games have been suspended.

The official word is that the games are being put on hold while the country is mourning the earthquake victims. Of course, this is the NBA, so conspiracy theories can’t be far behind. From Danwei:

Neither the newspaper nor SARFT’s media administrator has offered an explanation for the suspension. The only official explanation came from Jiang Heping, director of CCTV’s Olympic Channel, who said that the NBA was “too entertaining” for this special time when the country is mourning for the victims of the earthquake.

It seems that many have found Mr Jiang’s explanation unconvincing; people tend to believe that there has been a ban issued on broadcasting NBA games. There are a number of alternate theories on the internet, all highly speculative: Some people are arguing the ban is politically-motivated ?some NBA players have been protesting the role the Chinese government plays in Darfur?while the others think politics is unlikely the issue. After all, the last time NBA was banned in China was in 1999, after an American missile hit China’s embassy in Yugoslavia, and relations with the US are not nearly as tense as they were then.

The Beijing News also ran an article today about the NBA ban. In the article, an insider from CCTV is quoted as saying that NBA broadcasts will resume on June 6, though no official orders have been announced to the public. The article also refers to NBA’s announcement on May 28 of a 14 million-yuan donation to China’s earthquake relief.

I don’t know why the NBA game broadcasts have been suspended. To me, a little entertainment might be a good to help ease the pain of such a tragic event. And I’m willing to bet everything I’ve got that if Yao Ming and the Rockets were playing not only would the games be shown, they’d probably be on a continuous loop.

NBA broadcasting suspended in China. Courtesy of Danwei

NBA, China, playoffs, broadcast

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