The NFL offseason offers quarterbacks like Matthew Stafford quality time to watch the NBA. A Los Angeles Lakers fan, Matthew has often admitted his admiration for LeBron James. However, his wife, Kelly, who also follows sports like Matthew, has a different take on basketball—and perhaps an unpopular one.
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It all started during a conversation that the co-host, nicknamed Hank, had with Kelly on The Morning After podcast. Notably, Hank mentioned, “Unlike football, basketball is the game where you only need to watch the last 15 seconds.”
Hank explained his view by pointing out the long duration of an NBA game, where the score might be 20 to 30 early on but ends up 110 to 115. “Why waste all that time?” Hank asked.
Kelly agreed with Hank, offering her own take by comparing soccer and basketball, particularly the points system. She admitted that both the NBA and soccer are “hard to watch” for the same reason: scoring.
“Soccer is hard to watch because there’s not enough scoring. Basketball is hard to watch because there’s too much scoring. Honestly, NBA, this is a hot take, but I don’t find it to be regular basketball. I feel like it’s more one-on-one situations,” Kelly explained.
Like Kelly, many sports fans in the US prefer football over the NBA. According to a 2024 Gallup poll, 41% of U.S. adults say football is their favorite sport to watch, while baseball and basketball tie for second at 10% and 9%, respectively. Significantly, football has held the top spot in Gallup polling since 1972, surpassing baseball.
There are many NFL players, like Patrick Mahomes, who are avid basketball fans and regularly share game updates and thoughts on X. NFL analysts like Robert Griffin III and Dan Orlovsky also chime in on the NBA during the season.
The Conference Semifinal Game 2 between the Boston Celtics and the New York Knicks, from Wednesday, where the Knicks won 91-90, proved why the NBA’s points system can be exciting for its fan base.
Interestingly, the Knicks scored 30 points in the fourth quarter, snatching the lead from the Celtics, who scored only 17, to secure a narrow one-point win. The game highlighted the unpredictability factor that makes NBA games so thrilling.
Kelly also expressed her frustration with NBA players not playing by the rules in comparison to the NFL. She shared a humorous moment during the podcast, saying,
“This is so funny, though. Our Chef Chris, who is a basketball player, Matthew, and I always watch these games, and I’m like, travel, travel, carrying the ball, travel. And they look at me like, stop. Well, they’re not playing by the rules.”
Interestingly, the first round of the NBA postseason averaged 3.7 million viewers across ABC, ESPN, and TNT. This was up 6% from last year’s 3.5 million, according to Nielsen.
