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The NBA regular season finally begins Christmas Day with a slate of five games: Oklahoma City vs. Orlando, the Golden State Warriors vs. the Los Angeles Clippers, the Boston Celtics vs. the New York Knicks, the Chicago Bulls vs. the Los Angeles Lakers, and, in a rematch of last year鈥檚 finals, the Miami Heat will meet up with the Dallas Mavericks.听

So all is back to normal in professional basketball? Not quite. And it's just not the lockout-shortened season will feature 66 games instead of the usual 80-plus.

TV and TV technology are changing the league's revenue streams. And the NBA will have to catch up, if it wants to capitalize on its potential.

Start with the least obvious: Fans are less inclined to go to an actual game.

Oh, they still show up.听Over the past decade, the top attracting team (which changes from year to year) has averaged between 20,000 and 22,000 attendees per game. But except for the top-tier seats, they're less willing to pay for the experience, because it's better watching games at home.

鈥淭he gate revenues have been flat and falling since 2006,鈥� says聽Kenneth Wilbur, a marketing professor at Duke University鈥檚 Fuqua School of Business. So聽鈥渢eams are altering their mix of ticket prices.... Court seat prices are rising just as fast as they ever have. But in the second or third tier of seats in the arena, you get a better view at home. Those prices have been falling in a lot of NBA cities.鈥�

If teams are seeing smaller gate revenues, their TV profits聽continue to grow. The NBA has a $485 million annual contract with ABC/ESPN, as well as a $445 million deal with TNT. That works out to about $31 million for each of the league's 30 teams, a deal that wasn鈥檛 affected by the games lost during the lockout. Both contracts go through the 2015/16 season.

That's a healthy development, for the most part. The NBA is coming off a strong ratings performance to cap last season. The league finals between the Miami Heat and the Dallas Mavericks netted an average 17.3 million viewers per game. Game 6, in which the Mavericks bested LeBron James and company to win the title, was seen by nearly 24 million people. It was the most watched Game 6 since 2000, and it led to ABC having its best summer week in over a decade.

But there are drawbacks. For one, a reliance on TV revenues disproportionately benefits large market teams, who have a broader viewer base and can sign lucrative local TV contracts (in addition to the shared revenues from the ABC and TNT deals). This past February, for instance, the Los Angeles Lakers signed a 20-year, $3 billion deal with Time Warner Cable, allowing two new L.A. area channels to broadcast Lakers games. Teams playing in smaller markets, like Charlotte, Cleveland, and Sacramento, don鈥檛 have the local viewership to support such a contract, which means they miss out on that extra revenue.

What鈥檚 more, given equal salaries, big name players will prefer to play in a large market over a smaller one. The bigger stage offers more in terms of endorsement money, increased fame, and, often, better teammates,聽Mr.听Wilbur says. 鈥淪o the small markets lose out even more on ticket sales, and they鈥檙e already not buying in on TV revenue. It makes it harder and harder to compete.鈥�

This 鈥渟mall market鈥� issue was a driving force behind the league鈥檚 lockout. Several owners of teams in smaller cities wanted a larger proportion of revenues to be distributed among all teams, at the expense of player salaries. That鈥檚 exactly what they got in the lockout鈥檚 resolution, an agreement that cuts $300 million annually from players鈥� salaries and puts it back into the league, with the hopes that even the poorest teams will be able to partake in revenues.

Finally, the NBA isn鈥檛 using television 鈥� its future chief revenue stream 鈥� to its best advantage. In recent years, high-definition technology has become so widespread that 60 percent of American households have access to it, via TV, the Internet, or both, Wilbur says. Yet the NBA doesn鈥檛 have all of its games available in HD. Compare that to the National Football League, by far the most-watched pro sports league in the country, which has all of its games available in HD in one form or another.

鈥淭he NFL is letting the consumer choose how they want to consume the games,鈥� he says.听 鈥淚t might sound like a small thing, but it鈥檚 a huge difference when you鈥檝e got HD football competing with standard definition basketball.鈥�

鈥淚 don鈥檛 think someone would stop following the NBA because of it, but they miss out on the potential to gain new fans, especially kids,鈥� Wilbur adds. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 when your allegiances form. The NBA is missing out on that opportunity.鈥�

However, one part of the NBA viewer experience is much friendlier than the NFL鈥檚: The NBA has a much more relaxed hold on its game footage, allowing fans to create their own highlight reels and share them online. The NFL鈥檚 highlights are much more tightly controlled. 鈥淭he NBA is much more friendly in that regard, and they鈥檙e not giving up much revenue because of it,鈥� Wilbur says.听聽