The NBA picked money — and paywalls — over fans

Let’s try to figure out how it happened and what they had in mind.

We presume it was at a preseason meeting called by Adam Silver to determine the NBA’s postseason schedule, emphasis on TV money.

And so the NBA decided to sell a stack of playoff games to can’t-DVR-them streaming services for some quick, short-run dough in exchange for minimizing national audiences during what should be the maximized TV audiences period.

Furthermore, if the Knicks — representing the nation’s largest TV market — made the playoffs, the NBA would sell at least two of their first-round games to a streaming operation, to maximize the minimization of viewers.