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Harris Poll: Hockey more popular than NBA

MiZZZike*

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I remember a Sports Illustrated like 4 years ago that said something along the lines of why Hockey rules over the NBA.
 

MiZZZike*

Guest
Also, the question was which on the sports is your favorite.

People who watch basketball tend to watch football as well. Wheras Hockey is more of a niche sport and it's the only sport a lot of people watch.
 

boredmale

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Jul 13, 2005
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All it basically is saying is Hockey has a more "hard core" following then Basketball. My guess is rating for the shows would say otherwise who is more popular.
 

Old Hickory

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MiZZZike said:
I remember a Sports Illustrated like 4 years ago that said something along the lines of why Hockey rules over the NBA.
Click to expand...
That was in 1994
 
pelts35.com

pelts35.com

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Oct 4, 2004
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Troy McClure said:
I wonder if that's the danger of the NBA tying itself so much to Michael Jordan?
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I think it is more due to the fact that the quality of the NBA games is significantly lower than it was 5-10 years ago.
 
XX

XX

Waiting for Ishbia
Dec 10, 2002
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Well, living in Phoenix Im sort of spoiled when it comes to the NBA and entertaintment. I think its a boring sport but hot damn the Suns are fun to watch especially when they go on one of those runs.

IMO the parity of the NHL and its hardcore following make it a better sport.
 

LazRNN

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Dec 17, 2003
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MiZZZike said:
Also, the question was which on the sports is your favorite.

People who watch basketball tend to watch football as well. Wheras Hockey is more of a niche sport and it's the only sport a lot of people watch.
Click to expand...

Bingo.
 
Epsilon

Epsilon

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Oct 26, 2002
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FLYLine88 said:
They should have asked more people, only 2,000 people were polled.
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Actually that doesn't make much of a difference. If the sample was collected properly then 2000 is more than enough to draw a good inference about the population. But from the sounds of it (reading their methodology paragraph at the end) it wasn't, so these statistics don't mean very much.
 

Resolute

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Mar 4, 2005
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MiZZZike said:
Also, the question was which on the sports is your favorite.

People who watch basketball tend to watch football as well. Wheras Hockey is more of a niche sport and it's the only sport a lot of people watch.
Click to expand...

I don't buy that at all.

Why would a basketball fan be more likely to also watch football when compared to a hockey fan? All four sports, including baseball, are so wildly different that I do not believe any such blanket statement is possible to make.

I know a lot of hockey fans who are also football fans. Baseball fans. Lacrosse fans. Soccer fans.
 
Troy McClure

Troy McClure

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Mar 12, 2002
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Resolute said:
I don't buy that at all.
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The point is that the poll's question was stupid. Asking what is the favorite sport is meaningless. They should have asked what sports a person regularly watches or follows. By any measure of the actual audience and fanbase, basketball is much higher than hockey.
 

LazRNN

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Dec 17, 2003
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Troy McClure said:
The point is that the poll's question was stupid. Asking what is the favorite sport is meaningless. They should have asked what sports a person regularly watches or follows. By any measure of the actual audience and fanbase, basketball is much higher than hockey.
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Exactly. More hockey fans would say hockey is their favorite sport, even if they like others, where as there are more basketball fans that would name football or another sport as their favorite. The fact that basketball gets much higher television ratings but there is a poll that shows more people identified hockey as their 'favorite' sport supports this. I actually think a more scientific poll with the same question would yield the same results.
 
Ted Hoffman

Ted Hoffman

The other Rick Zombo
Dec 15, 2002
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ESPN sucks. ESPN has the NBA. The NBA sucks.

It was a perfect fit. The NHL was keeping ESPN from sucking worse, so they needed to jettison off that good piece to help make the network stink as much as possible.

That, and dump Rich Eisen while keeping Stuart Scott. I'm honestly surprised Steve Levy and Trey Wingo are still there; as much as people rag on Levy, he's still got more talent than pretty much everyone you see on ESPNews. Combined.
 

Transported Upstater

Guest
Basketball sucks. I hate it almost as much as baseball (wait, that's not possible). I'm probably the only person from Syracuse who doesn't like basketball.


Hockey and football are the shiznit.

I cannot believe I just wrote "shiznit." I have problems.
 

Resolute

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Troy McClure said:
The point is that the poll's question was stupid. Asking what is the favorite sport is meaningless. They should have asked what sports a person regularly watches or follows. By any measure of the actual audience and fanbase, basketball is much higher than hockey.
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I don't think the question was stupid, but rather that the interpretation was flawed. People are reading too much into a simple question.

Simply put "What is your favorite sport" is not a question that could possibly determine "what sport is more popular?" It was a fault in logic that leads people to equate the two.

You are correct that almost every measure, basketball is more popular than hockey. Gate attendance and TV ratings show this in spades.

None the less, I find the argument that basketball fans are more likely than hockey fans to name a different sport as their favorite to be very illogical as well.
 
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Shootmaster_44

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Sep 10, 2005
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I can't remember the exact place I saw the poll but I believe it was Sports Illustrated's 50 States profiles. At the end of their 50 states run I believe they tallied the numbers of those surveyed with a similar question of what's your favorite sport or something to that effect. I seem to remember that the WNBA finished tied with the NHL and the NBA was ahead.

However, the one thing to keep in mind about polls is that the numbers can be schewed to make any result. Its much like political polls, you can say do you believe x is better than y and get one result but you can also change the wording slightly do you believe x is doing a better job than y and get a different result.

I put no stock in polls really, the better testament to which league or sport is more popular is to take a combination of attendance (as a percentage of capacity as MLB and NFL stadiums are much larger than NHL and NBA arenas), merchandise sales and tv ratings. Since I am no math wizard, I am not sure what formula you would use to come to a reasonable figure to stack one against the other. But those are a truer test of how well liked one league or sport is over another.

Out of curiosity of the 4 major leagues (NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB) how to they rank in your mind in terms of your own enjoyment?

For me I'd say:
1. NHL
2. MLB
3. NFL
4. NBA

However, I'd rank alot more things above the NBA, but for statistical purposes I will leave those 4. For the purpose of this experiment I will use the 4-3-2-1 point method. Obviously, the NHL will win as this is a hockey board but it would be interesting to see which is 2-4.
 

Nas_Bert_Morr*

Guest
Dolemite said:
People are tired of watching a bunch of old guys who foul alot.
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Old guys? NBA players are on average younger than NHL players...
 

Phil333

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Dec 26, 2003
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As other people have said, anyone who knows anything about polling knows this study is flawed. A much better poll would have had people rank their top 5 or top 10 sports.
 

Resolute

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Shootmaster_44 said:
Out of curiosity of the 4 major leagues (NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB) how to they rank in your mind in terms of your own enjoyment?
Click to expand...

Personally, I'd tie baseball and hockey both at #1. NBA 3, NFL 4 only becuase you have excluded the NLL and CFL.
 
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