YouTube has been on the hunt for original content for quite some time and has been successful in generating a lot of traffic to its site thanks to events like Felix Baumgartner’s space dive. However, the Google owned site has been looking for content that is more than a one off global event, something it can provide consistently. It recently became apparent that the video streaming site has met its goal when The National Basketball Association (NBA) announced a partnership with YouTube on November 20. The Google owned video site will live stream Development League basketball games live for the 2012-13 season. There will be simultaneous broadcast of the 350 games on the NBA’s development league channel and on the basketball organizations website.
The first games will be streamed on YouTube starting Friday, November 23. The free entertainment will feature the D-Leagues 16 teams that are linked to major NBA franchises and act as a way for players to make their way into the big league. Fans will get a chance to see some very promising players play ball against rivals that may end up in major NBA teams. According to the NBA 20% of all players in the NBA first got started in the D-league.
The major feature about the games on YouTube is the fact that they will be archived so users can go back and watch them easily. There is also a free NBA app that allows users to watch the games on mobile devices and has both image and video content for Android and iOS powered devices.
The NBA has been quite active with YouTube and online video content, becoming the first official professional sports league to partner with YouTube in 2005. The league launched its own YouTube channel in 2007 and now has 960 million viewed videos.
Source: The Next Web