Holiday games confirm leagues worship $$$

If I were King … So, Christmas Eve there again were no NBA games scheduled, which made no sense for game workers, broadcast workers and pre-COVID ticket-buyers who would much prefer to work or attend games on Christmas Eve than abandon their families and the holiday on Christmas Day. But on Christmas Day, the NBA, fully devoted to TV money, schedules five national game telecasts.

On Thanksgiving Day, thousands of folks who prefer to be with families and loved ones are ordered to work so the NFL can televise three games, one for CBS money, one for NBC money, one for Fox money.

And Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a day for all Americans to solemnly reflect on his achievements and assassination, is now annually scheduled to be loaded with and devoted to NBA games — in somber salute to Dr. King, of course.

➤ Is there a more media-certified myth than NFL teams “tanking” the season to improve their draft pick?

1) The likelihood that the head coach — an Adam Gase — won’t be back is such a given that to think he’d be eager to grease his own skid and lose as a favor to the team about to fire him, is ridiculous. Why not just punch yourself in the eyes?

2) That players, so many of them deemed expendable after a rotten season, would voluntarily feed their departure and diminished standing by playing conspicuously bad football is absurd. Wait for me! I’ll punch myself in the eyes, too!

But “tanking,” the NFL myth, is here to stay.