NBA Finals players from both the Lakers and the Heat engaged with fans more on Instagram than Twitter throughout the last two months in the Orlando bubble. Lakers F LeBron James led all players in August and September Instagram interactions with 76.6 million, over seven times more than the next closest player, teammate Kyle Kuzma. Kuzma was also second in Twitter engagement, though the gap between James and him was much less at 7.5 million.
HEAT CHECK: For the Heat, Jimmy Butler outpaced his teammates on Instagram with 4.5 million in total interactions, with rookie sensation Tyler Herro behind him at 2 million. Herro far eclipsed all players in engagement rate on Twitter (16.3%) and Instagram (14.2%). In second for each social site is Heat F Bam Adebayo’s 2.5% rate on Twitter and G Goran Dragic’s 7.5% rate on Instagram. While both these players fell short of teammate Herro by a wide margin, the two along with Butler still managed higher engagement rates than the entire Lakers’ starting 5.
LEADING THE WAY: Despite Heat players leading in engagement rate, the two most engaged posts of the period went to James (1.69 million for a tweet on 8/26) and Kuzma (645,000 for an Instagram post on 9/14). Lakers players rounded out the top five in this category, with a Butler post coming in sixth and a Herro post landing seventh. The Lakers, thanks in large part to James, eclipsed the Heat comfortably on both social media sites with 81.8 million more interactions on Instagram and 11.5 million on Twitter. Removing James' social contribution to the Lakers still gives the team a slight lead of 9 million (Instagram) and 1.5 million (Twitter) over the Heat.
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