3 things to watch for when Cavs schedule is released: National TV
Last season the Cleveland Cavaliers were hardly an exciting prospect for the NBA’s national television partners. Coming off of a 22-win season, the Cavs didn’t have any household names beyond the corpse of Kevin Love, played in a small market and were mainly interesting just to Cavs fans and NBA nerds.
That resulted in 0 nationally televised primetime games on the major networks at the start of the season. As the games ticked by and the Cavs proved their worth – resurrecting Love, placing two players in the All-Star Game and debuting a rookie phenom in Evan Mobley – they earned some flex games later in the year, primarily on NBA TV.
Will this year be different? The Cavs won’t be featured on Opening Night or Christmas Day, but that was never going to happen. Perhaps in a few years when the Cavs are a proven contender and the combination of Mobley and Darius Garland is All-NBA level, but for now, the Cavs have appeal as the unique, scrappy young team on the rise. That’s interesting but can’t compete with the star power of LeBron James and the Los Angeles Lakers, or the Milwaukee Bucks and Giannis Antetokounmpo.
Still, the Cavs should earn some amount of national television airtime. They aren’t in the dregs of the league this season, and an 82-game season affords plenty of slots. Do the Cavs make it onto one or two national television showcases? Can they show up more often? The Cavs can’t expect to match the Boston Celtics or Miami Heat, but they can reasonably expect more national television respect. Will they receive it?