Game On: Reimagining NBA Fan Engagement

For younger viewers in their 20s, sport is no longer competing with linear television hits such as soap operas or great drama, but rather with gaming and social media. These fans are more likely to use a mobile or tablet to stream the NBA, rather than lounge in front of a big screen. Instead, their fingers are active, scrolling, swiping and typing, looking for more information and analysis and ways to engage and interact.

Gen Z are therefore far more likely to want real-time extras above and beyond the action in front of them. And of all the sports in the United States right now, it is the basketball that dominates amongst this audience, with seven of the top ten biggest U.S. athletes on social, playing for the NBA (can you name them – answers at the end of the piece.)

Just as the NBA can be relied upon to produce the next global superstars of the game – hello Victor Wembanyama – we work with them to develop the next generation of fan experience, transforming how the sport is watched. And that is a lot of eyeballs about to get a treat. At the last count, the NBA has 2 billion fans worldwide, with more than 1 billion people viewing portions of an NBA game – about one in eight of the people on the planet.

Coupling AI with the incredible variety and depth of exclusive NBA content Sportradar can access, allows us to innovate new ways that fans can get closer to the action, and start to make some real inroads into that next billion. New technology is enabling us to process a greater volume of data at ultra-low latency, allowing for a deeper analysis of the on-court action, and a truer understanding of what the fans are watching. And it is also allowing new forms of content – customized analytics served up in real-time, truly immersing the viewer into the action and allowing for engagement during live play. The greatest stories will now be even richer and more interactive, and the appreciation of the world’s greatest players, even deeper.

And as our work with the NBA allows them to find new audiences and increase revenue, our other clients further downstream are able to benefit in kind. With a packed calendar offering more than 1200 games in just eight months, it is little wonder that the NBA is one of sport’s greatest properties. And that’s why we’ve rolled out a series of new and enhanced products for clients to provide an even greater experience to fans.

New for this season thanks to generative AI technology, we can offer betting operators Virtualised Live Match Tracker, which delivers a hyper-personalized experience through computer vision-generated custom viewing angles, as well as Sportradar 4Sight, which creates real-time, dynamic animations overlaying the live action so punters can better understand what is happening on the court. We first launched 4Sight with ATP tennis earlier this year and it has added another way for fans to experience the game.

We have a couple of new developments for our media partners, too. emBET, currently available within NBA League Pass in the U.S., is now compatible with internet-connected televisions and Android devices, while the new ‘betsync’ functionality allows fans to track their bets within a broadcast. And, through rich, interactive graphics and animations, advanced visualizations of NBA action leverage real-time skeletal tracking data to create engaging content, such as 3D animations, heat maps and player performance metrics, that bring to life the storytelling and analysis of action on the court.

The ongoing convergence of sports, betting and media is resulting in the biggest transformation in fan engagement since the invention of the internet! Our unique position at the heart of this ecosystem ensures our industry-leading products set us apart from the competition. And we’re only just getting started, with a long-term pipeline of content secured across global sports to build and scale innovations. A new season of NBA, and a new era for Sportradar’s solutions. Enjoy the action.

(Answer to my question: LeBron James, Stephen Curry, Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, Kyrie Irving, Chris Paul and James Harden)