The NBA and its franchises have never been more valuable. When the recently down-on-their-luck Milwaukee Bucks are able to cash in for a cool $550 million, and the tumultuous Donald Sterling/Clippers saga ends with a $2 billion price tag, the league is clearly enjoying a bullish market for teams with this season's tip-off just two short weeks away.
Look no further than the recently extended TV deal between the NBA, ESPN and Turner Networks — said to be valued at $24 billion over a nine-year extension — to see just how valuable the league's media dollars have become. Beyond the players, the stadiums, the coaches and brand marketing, each team proves its media worth in DVR-proof entertainment and the endless exposure fan and press involvement provides.
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But what is that "media value" really worth? A new General Sentiment report set out to find the value of each team's media impact since October 2013 using the firm's impact media value statistic, which aims to see how much of any one team's value can be attributed to its relative strength (or weakness) via media exposure potential.
The statistic takes into account how often a team is mentioned, where it's mentioned and how positive or negative in tone that mention is. Using a $5-per-thousand ideology, General Sentiment then assigns a dollar value to each captured mention relying on its exposure and sentiment to aggregate daily dollars values for earned media exposure across the web. General Sentiment tracks mentions across the web on Twitter, Facebook, news media, social media, forums, blogs and comment sections, among other sources.
With these three inputs taken daily over the last year, General Sentiment was able to see just how valuable each team's media footprint is, and provide a strong baseline for what to expect come the 2014-15 season.
Let's start with the bottom 20 teams:
30. Philadelphia 76ers $15.1 million
29. Charlotte Hornets $15.8 million
28. Orlando Magic $18.6 million
27. Denver Nuggets $20.0 million
26. Phoenix Suns $26.1 million
25. Detroit Pistons $32.6 million
24. Washington Wizards $33.9 million
23. Sacramento Kings $38.4 million
22. Memphis Grizzlies $39.0 million
21. New Orleans Pelicans $39.7 million
20. Toronto Raptors $41.1 million
19. Houston Rockets $43.4 million
18. Utah Jazz $43.9 million
17. Brooklyn Nets $44.0 million
16. Minnesota Timberwolves $45.1 million
15. Oklahoma City Thunder $56.6 million
14. Portland Trail Blazers $67.4 million
13. Dallas Mavericks $95.0 million
12. Milwaukee Bucks $97.1 million
11. Boston Celtics $107.7 million
The General Sentiment media value methodology can play both benefactor and vicious degrader of each team's overall media value impact over the last 12 months. Teams like the Grizzlies, which were measured to have the best team ratio of good-to-bad comments across the web in the last year at 2.1:1, were hampered by an overall lack of pure volume of chatter about the team.
Alternatively, the Nets, a team that attracted a ton of attention for its payroll and underachieving run in 2013-14, suffered from the weight of negativity to many of the online conversations about the team. The 76ers, seen as tanking much of the season, brought up the rear as a direct result of negativity leveled in the organization's direction.
On to the top 10:
10. Indiana Pacers $172.9 million
Another deep run in the playoffs despite some struggles kept the Pacers toward the head of the league in overall volume of coverage, while a shocking injury to star Paul George while doing Team USA duty gave the Pacers a strong hold on the No. 10 spot in media exposure value.
9. Atlanta Hawks $186.1 million
A team equipped with both a feel good story — the eighth-seeded Hawks nearly upset the Pacers in the first round of the playoffs — and a legendarily strong social media footprint combined all of its media goodwill into a top-10 ranking as far as media value is concerned since October 2013. We'll see what Atlanta does for an encore in 2014-15.
8. Golden State Warriors $193.7 million
News of a new stadium and a duo of players who seemingly could hit 3-pointers from anywhere on the court in Steph Curry and Klay Thompson provided the Warriors with all they needed to be one of the league's most attractive draws both on the court and on social media.
7. Cleveland Cavaliers $208.6 million
While the on-court doings of the Cavaliers weren't much to bark about in 2013-14, it was an offseason to remember in Cleveland, which gained more than two-thirds of its overall yearly media value in the months since free agency started — and LeBron returned home.
6. Miami Heat $226.7 million
Falling short of a third straight title dashed hopes of mid-'90s Bulls or early '00s Lakers comparisons for Heat faithful, but in a season filled with speculation about the locker room environment in Miami and the league's biggest stars on the court gave the Heat just what it needed to be one of the league's most visible teams.
5. New York Knicks $255.4 million
Any season playing in the sports media capital is bound to end in a huge amount of media exposure value gained, but the news that Phil Jackson was returning to Madison Square Garden ended up being the second-most associated topic with the team, driving more conversations about the Knicks than anyone other than Camelo Anthony over the last 12 months.
4. Chicago Bulls $280.4 million
When measuring simple positive mentions of all NBA teams across the web, the Bulls ended finishing second, just short of the NBA champion Spurs' mark. That, combined with a Christmas Day game, a constant stream of news about Derrick Rose's knees and a No. 4 spot in the Eastern Conference, was enough to bring Chicago all the way up toward the top of the media value rankings.
3. San Antonio Spurs $306.8 million
While free agency, injuries, contract issues and debilitating controversy headlining the NBA's 2013-14 season, it was the Spurs that provided the comforting positivity that gave the defending champs the media value leg up over the last 12 months. With the most positive mentions measured of any team and a +42 overall web sentiment (measured -100 to +100), the Spurs sprang into the top-5 with ease.
2. Los Angeles Clippers $320.0 million
The sentiment word driving the most conversation over the last year for the Clippers was "win" — a case that was shared by more than half of the NBA's 30 teams. But unlike any of the other 30, the second-most influential sentiment word used to describe the Clippers was "racist," as in describing former Clippers owner Donald Sterling. While media value discounts mentions for their overall negativity, the "all new is good news" methodology that drives media value can sometimes overpower the weight given to negative commentary and what you end up seeing is the undeniable footprint of media coverage reflected in the statistic, as is the case here with the Clippers.
1. Los Angeles Lakers $395.8 million
Forget finishing 14th out of 15 teams in the Western Conference. Forget having words like "worst," "injury" and "hate" drive sentiment conversation about your team. With Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles media market in the country at their back, the Lakers were never really in danger of missing the top-5 in this list, much less claiming General Sentiment's No. 1 spot for earned media value for 2013-14.
General Sentiment is a Long Island, N.Y.-based social analytics company that focuses on social insight for brands, products, sports and TV. Find them on Twitter @gensent