Anyone else checking out NBA TV's "Silent Game"?
by Richard Lawler 
posted Feb 26th 2006 at 5:25PM
In case
you missed
it, today the NBA is broadcasting a game between the Orlando Magic and Houston Rockets, with no announcers, and all
sound coming from the arena announcer and courtside mounted mics. So far so good, it's so much like being there I stood
in line for 20 minutes to get a beer from my own refrigerator. The only weird thing is going to commercial breaks
because there's no segue.It's being broadcast in high definition on INHD1, so check it out This also an excellent opportunity to check out DARKONATION in action, recently freed from the Detroit Pistons who played the Cleveland Cavaliers earlier today. I didn't catch that game (too busy playing Fight Night), was it broadcast in high definition or another disappointment?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
BA @ Feb 26th 2006 6:03PM
I'm loving the silent game, especially since the home team is slowly clawing its way back into the game in the fourth quarter, which makes for a raucous crowd.
Scott K @ Feb 26th 2006 11:05PM
Did anyone catch if the same silence was present on the NBA TV HD feed? Usually the INHD games are the same that are shown in the NBA TV channel. I just attended the Pistons vs Cavs game in person today and was sort of comparing the experience of watching on tv and being there in my head....seeing a commentary free game would have been interesting on tv.
Ben @ Feb 27th 2006 7:29AM
This is odd...yesterday afternoon I was watching the 2nd half of the Villanova-Connecticut game. With about 10 mintues left, the announcers dropped out. All the other sounds still worked, just their voices were gone. I have Comcast, and if I changed the channel to the SD channel, then their voices were there, but not on the HD channel.
It was a nice experience. On one level the announcing is kind of part of the game, on another level it can get kind of annoying, espeically since they are wrong a lot of times on people's names, who fouled who, etc.
derrick @ Feb 27th 2006 11:08AM
It was a refreshing change at times the announcers are so annoying. One thing they needed to bring the sound even higher.
rothgar @ Feb 27th 2006 1:18PM
with my fusionhdtv5 card and their fusionhd software I can take out the announcers in just about any sporting event. my motherboard has optical, spdif, and 2 channel audio. If I set the output to be anything but spdif the announcers are gone and I am just left with the crowd and refs. I do it sometimes when I don't like the announcers or if I'm not really watching the game and just want background noise. Commercials don't have any voices either (just music) so that turns out to be a nice bonus.