Artificial intelligence is likely the last thing that comes into mind when you think about basketball.
Yet, the NBA announced its latest AI program, NB-AI, a day after OpenAI released its text-to-video project, Sora. NBA commissioner Adam Silver demonstrated how the platform changes the aesthetics of a basketball game to look like your favorite movies.
The National Basketball Association’s AI evolution seems like an odd phenomenon, but you have to remember that the sport continues to change. For example, it’s still the same game of shooting balls into hoops, but the NBA said players make more 3-point shots nowadays. Teams know it is a more efficient way to score, so they train more to make these long-range shots.
This writer will discuss how NB-AI works, how it could impact future games and other ways artificial intelligence is changing the sports industry.
How does NB-AI work?
Adam Silver told NB-AI, “Show me the Pacers game as if it were a Spiderman movie.” In response, the machine flashed this phrase on-screen and revealed a modified version of the Indiana Pacers match.
Specifically, the AI chose to adjust the visuals to the style of the 2023 film, “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.” You can see in the X video above how the players sport the iconic cell-shaded animation style of the superhero flick.
Spurs rookie Victor Wembanyama was also at the demonstration, which shared ways to view and buy sneakers players wear in real time. Moreover, NB-AI can spot close contests during the action.
An Inquirer Sports article reported that the AI program will “personalize the live game viewing experience.” Also, Silver said, “Today, AI is creating a similar excitement to what we saw around the early days of the Internet.”
“Intuitively, most of us have a sense that artificial intelligence is going to change our lives. The question, at least for now, is ‘How?’”
“It’s incredible,” Wemby replied. “It’s still in the early days. Only the future will say what it will look like.”
How is AI changing sports?
Artificial intelligence is doing more than merely changing how you watch basketball games. It is transforming many aspects of other sports, such as maintaining player health and sharing updates.
This writer also discussed in another Tech post that it can predict the chances of getting injuries. Moreover, it detects dips in performance so that an athlete can train accordingly.
The Philippines also took the initiative by revealing its AI sportscasters from the Global Media Arts (GMA) network. NMI Studios Head of Creatives Ramil Escarda assured the public that “it doesn’t replace human ingenuity.”
“It amplifies it, making our storytelling more powerful and accessible,” he added. Moreover, artificial intelligence can provide customized training regimens to maximize results for athletes.
It can adjust on the fly, raising the difficulty of improving performance further or adding recovery sessions to prevent injuries. Besides NB-AI, artificial intelligence improves the sports viewing experience by using facial recognition to help fans find their seats.