As the national broadcaster of the NBA, CBS aired NBA games from the 1973–74 until the 1989–90 season, during which the early 1980s is notoriously known as the tape delay playoff era.
NBA entered the cable territory in 1979 when USA Network signed a three-year $1.5 million deal and extended for two years until the 1983–84 season, ESPN also had a brief affair with NBA from 1982 to 1984. Turner Sports obtained rights to air NBA games beginning with the 1984–85 season (replacing ESPN and USA Network as national cable partners) under a four-year deal, in which TBS shared the NBA television package along with CBS. In the summer of 1987, Turner Broadcasting System signed a new joint broadcast contract between TBS and TNT to split broadcast NBA games starting from the 1988–89 season. TNT held rights to broadcast the NBA draft, most NBA regular season and playoff games, while TBS only aired single games or doubleheaders once a week.
Year-by-year summary 1980 By the 1979–1980 season, the network's NBA ratings had bottomed, with a regular season rating for the broadcasts at 6.4. By this time, the network had eliminated its regional coverage and only used two play-by-play announcers (Brent Musburger and Gary Bender) and three color commentators (Bill Russell and Rod Hundley, who teamed with Musburger and Rick Barry, who teamed with Bender); CBS felt that showing an NBA Finals game was not worth pre-empting their Friday night lineup (the smash hit Dallas in particular) during May sweeps (although the iconic episode in which J.R. Ewing was shot aired on March 21, 1980, and Dallas was already in summer reruns). The consensus was that a basketball game in prime time would have drawn fewer viewers. As a result, CBS used to regularly run NBA games in the 11:30 p.m. time slot (then occupied by The CBS Late Movie). For the 1980 and 1981 NBA Finals, CBS scheduled Games 3 and 4 on back-to-back days (Saturday and Sunday) to avoid an extra tape delay game.
In 1980, the 26 share from 1976 had fallen to 18%. Ratings fell to a level where, as mentioned before, CBS began airing games on tape delay. The 1981 NBA Finals set the standard for futility, with an average rating of 6.7, the lowest in NBA history until the 2003 NBA Finals averaged a 6.5 on ABC.
When it came time for CBS to broadcast Game 6 of the 1980 Finals (on Friday, May 16), the network gave its affiliates the option of either airing the game live or on tape delay (in fact, WAGA-TV in Atlanta did not carry the NBA on CBS for numerous years). If the affiliate chose to air the game later that night, then the prime time schedule would consist of reruns of The Incredible Hulk, The Dukes of Hazzard and Dallas (CBS, NBC and ABC ended the 1979–80 seasons in late March and early April in anticipation of a strike by the Screen Actors Guild, which came to fruition in July 1980). The clinching Game 6 of the 1980 Finals between the Los Angeles Lakers and Philadelphia 76ers was, most notably, aired live in the Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Portland and Seattle markets; CBS stations in the latter three markets were able to air the game live and still show most of the CBS prime time schedule since the game tipped at 6:00 p.m. Pacific Time. Otherwise, most CBS affiliates chose to air Game 6 on tape delay.
The reason for this scheduling dilemma was that the NBA had opted to start the regular season earlier. Starting in the mid-1970s, the NBA had pushed back the start of the regular season, resulting in it ending increasingly later (for example, April 6 in 1975, April 11 in 1976). Prior to that, the regular season had always ended in late March. For the 1979–1980 and 1980–1981 seasons, the NBA reverted to the earlier practice, with the season ending respectively on March 30, 1980, and March 29, 1981 (both falling on a Sunday). That meant that the Finals in those years began in the first week of May rather than the end of May, and as a result, the weeknight games were played during May ratings sweeps. Consequently, weeknight games held on the West Coast started at 8:30 p.m. Pacific Time, which was 11:30 p.m. in the Eastern Time Zone; those games could be shown live. However, non-West Coast weeknight games required tape-delay, to be shown at 11:30 p.m.
1980 NBA Finals: The series-deciding Game 6 became the most notorious example of CBS's practice of showing even the most important NBA games on "tape delay" broadcasts. Because May 16, 1980 was a Friday, the network did not want to preempt two of its highest-rated shows, The Dukes of Hazzard and Dallas, even though both shows were already in reruns: the 1979–80 TV season had ended early, back in March, in anticipation of a strike that summer by the Screen Actors Guild. So Game 6 was shown at 11:30pm Eastern (10:30pm Central) in all but four US cities: Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Portland and Seattle, who carried it live. The game was not broadcast at all in Atlanta. (This is often cited as an example of TV's lack of interest in the NBA in the "pre-Magic and Bird" era.) On a side note, here, in Game 4 of the 1980 Finals, Julius Erving executed the "Baseline Move", a behind-the-board reverse layup that seemed to defy gravity. Play-by-play announcer Brent Musburger has noted that Erving made such moves almost routine in his ABA days—but the ABA had no national TV contract in those days. This Game 4 move, played to a national audience in a title game, has likely become Julius Erving's most famous move.
1981 In 1980, USA televised two NBA games on Christmas Day. Jim Karvellas and Richie Powers called the early game involving New Jersey at Washington. Meanwhile, Eddie Doucette and Steve Jones called the late game involving Golden State at Portland.
The 1980–1981 season was arguably the rock bottom point of the tape delay era for CBS. CBS aired four of the six Finals games on tape delay and six of nine during the Conference finals. Just like the previous year, CBS scheduled Games 3 and 4 of the NBA Finals without an off-day to avoid yet another tape delayed game. CBS wanted the Pacific teams to advance in the playoffs so that they could show live games at 11:30 p.m. on the Eastern U.S.; however, the Los Angeles Lakers and Portland Trail Blazers were upset in Round 1, while the Phoenix Suns were upset in Round 2. This left two teams located in the Central Time Zone, the Houston Rockets and Kansas City Kings, to play in the Western Conference finals.
Between 1981 and 1983, ratings for CBS' NBA telecasts rose by 12%. CBS' highest-rated NBA game (and the only NBA game that scored more than 20 ratings points for the network) was Game 7 of the 1988 NBA Finals between the Lakers and the Detroit Pistons. By the end of its coverage, CBS' NBA ratings had been mostly respectable, with the lowest-rated Final after 1982 scoring a 12.3 (three times), a mark higher than any NBA Final since 1998.
From 1979–1981, CBS aired weekday NBA Finals games on tape delay if they were not played on the West Coast. Games were televised after the late local news (11:30 p.m.) in the CBS Late Movie time slot. In some cases, games were seen live in the cities whose local NBA teams were playing. In 1981 for example, WNAC-TV Boston and KHOU-TV Houston carried Games 1, 2, 5 and 6 live, although most viewers around the country had to wait until after the late local news to see them. 1981: The series between the Boston Celtics and the Houston Rockets was the lowest rated NBA Finals in history (6.7 rating over six games), until the 2003 NBA Finals drew only 6.5 percent of American television households. Four games of the 1981 series (Games 1, 2, 5 and the climatic Game 6) were telecast on tape delay outside of Boston and Houston. As previously mentioned, before 2003, the 1981 NBA Finals received the lowest television rating in NBA history. The 1981 Finals drew a 6.7 rating, according to Nielsen Media Research. Meanwhile, the 2003 Finals between the San Antonio Spurs and New Jersey Nets drew a 6.5 rating. Due to this, the 1981 Finals were the last to be broadcast on tape-delay, with weeknight games airing after the late local news in most cities. Games 3 and 4 were played back-to-back on Saturday and Sunday, May 9 and 10, to give CBS two live Finals games. Following the Finals, Gary Bender was relegated to tertiary play-by-play for the rest of his tenure in CBS, while Rick Barry's contract, following his questionable racial comments about Bill Russell during the Finals, was not renewed. Russell would remain the main color analyst for the next two years alongside newly promoted main play-by-play commentator Dick Stockton. Curiously, Barry and Russell would reunite, this time on the NBA on TBS during the mid-1980s. Russell was replaced as CBS' lead analyst following the 1983 Finals by former Celtics teammate Tom Heinsohn.
1982 During the 1981–82 season, Al Albert and Hubie Brown called the early game on USA while Eddie Doucette and Steve "Snapper" Jones called the late game. Hubie Brown was subsequently replaced by Jon McGlocklin as Al Albert's partner.
Greg Gumbel and John Andariese were some of the voices of the original telecasts of The NBA on ESPN, which lasted only two seasons. Tom Mees was among the studio hosts. During a commercial break of a game at Madison Square Garden, the announcers (Greg Gumbel and Chris Berman) danced to the song "Little Darling" that was played on the public address system of the arena. That blooper reel is still often played when ESPN celebrates a milestone.
Other announcers during this period1982–'83 NBA Announcing CrewsNBA Announcing Crews included: Irv Brown (game analyst) Ken Charles (game analyst) Jim Simpson (play-by-play) Roger Twibell (play-by-play) Dick Vitale (game analyst) Fred White (play-by-play) Geoff Witcher (play-by-play)
The '82 Finals marked the first time since 1978 that all of the games aired live in its entirely. As a compromise between CBS and the NBA, the season returned to late October after starting it in early October the previous two seasons, meaning that the championship series started after the conclusion of May sweeps. Also, Brent Musburger served as anchor for Game 1 in Philadelphia, but had to anchor Games 2 and 3 from New York, because he hosted CBS Sports Sunday. So anchoring the coverage in Musburger's absence were Frank Glieber (Games 2–4) and Pat O'Brien (Game 5).
1983 In the 1982–83 season, CBS significantly reduced the number of regular season broadcasts from 18 to four. The rationale was that cable television networks (namely, the USA Network and ESPN) were carrying a large number of regular season games (at least 40 each). In return, CBS executives believed that the public was being oversaturated with NBA coverage.
1983 NBA Finals: CBS joined Game 1 in progress with 7:37 left in the first period (meaning, there was no standard pregame coverage). Following the introduction montage (which was notable as it marked premiere of the intercutting, Bill Feigenbaum created CGI rendering of Boston Garden, used by CBS through the start of the 1989 Finals) with narration by anchor Brent Musburger, things were quickly passed off to play-by-play man Dick Stockton.
1984 For the 1983–84 season, CBS would televise just ten (out of 170 nationally) regular season games. Meanwhile, CBS televised about 16 playoff games.