Since the beginning of this week or so after the initial propaganda campaign ended, NBA TV, which would normally be showing the summer league right now, along with more commentary and analysis from guys like Rick Kamla and Steve Smith among others, has instead turned into two things essentially: the NBA History Channel and WNBA TV.  Meanwhile, the NBA TV analysts have all but vanished from the landscape.......

NBA History Channel

This week, we've seen dunk contests from the late '80's and early '90's when Kenny the Jet Smith was playing, and yesterday, they were showing past NBA Drafts from 1984 to 1991.  While no one should be happy about a lockout, I actually am enjoying watching a lot of these past drafts and documentaries about the old days.  Yes, I was born well after the Bullets only NBA Championship against the Seattle Supersonics, I meant the Oklahoma City Thunder (sorry Commissioner Stern), but it is giving me a renewed appreciation of basketball before the current era of Kobe and LeBaby, and I really am taking a step back to watch it and appreciate it.  Watching the old drafts is also fun actually, because I wiki up a lot of the players who were hot commodities back then but had pro careers that didn't quite match up to that.  I definitely will DVR the 1978 NBA Finals highlights when they get to it, and I know they will have to at some point because they did show Shawn Kemp in his Sonics jersey after all.

I also wouldn't mind one bit for NBA TV to perhaps make some more documentaries, like "Where are they now?" shows if they haven't out of some of these Draft classes back in those years, and I think they'll be worth watching too from a historical perspective because most of those drafted players didn't have long careers. 

To keep the modern day folks in the loop, I would like to see Rick Kamla or Kenny Smith host a show on NBA History with live call ins and stuff.  Who's the best team in the 1970's?  Best player in the 1970's?  Sure, the channel will inadvertently have to market current day players because some callers may say that Dr. J is a 1970's version of Vince Carter, but I hope you guys are understanding what I'm saying.  NBA History buffs would have field days with these types of shows during this lockout and I think it will do better than expected, since the NBA as of late has lived a bit too much in the now.

Even after the lockout ends, I'd still like to see a commitment to showing more truly historical games and documentaries than they have in recent memory.

WNBA TV

Because it's WNBA season right now, these games would be on regardless, but they are sobering reminders that they are the only link to the modern day world on NBA TV until something happens in the lockout.

I remember that NBA TV used to show more WNBA specials on NBA TV around the time of the draft and NBA Inside Stuff (don't know if it's still on now,) would routinely show WNBA players in the NBA offseason, have more in depth interviews with players, etc.  I would like to see more of that actually, and I would like to see a Euroleague show as well for that matter, since they used to have a weekly show on it. 

With a lot of free time on the channel, now is also good time to show more modern day WNBA team documentaries, like Wizards Magazine: The Journey the past couple seasons.  I love watching those, regardless of the team for some reason.  I like watching the Terps and UVA football documentaries too on Comcast SportsNet just to name a couple after Wizards Magazine.  It is also the WNBA's 15th season and they can certainly have a long special on that.

If NBA Inside Stuff or whatever show replaced it is off the air, BRING IT BACK!!  And bring Summer Sanders back too because she was sooo hot back then!  If I also remember right, Joumana Kidd also had a show on the channel....

WHERE IS THE NEWS OR DAILY UPDATES ON TV?

Rick Kamla, Steve Smith, Brent Barry, Kenny the Jet, and friends are all nowhere to be seen since the lockout started.  Don't tell me they all lost their jobs.  If nothing else, they can just host all the WNBA news and specials which is what they usually did in years past as well....   Sure, change the NBA website to a historical newsletter and some WNBA links.  But don't take away the broadcasters, because the NFL didn't do that!  They're still showing their current players for that matter.

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Those are pretty much my thoughts on the state of NBA TV right now.  The channel could be showing more current day material than it is, but I still do really love the historical moments, and it can give some of the kids like "Sean" from Bad Teacher lessons on how good the NBA was before LeBron showed up.