Only part of sport is televised. You don't see camp or practice, which is a big part of the game too. The game you watch on TV is like the shipping product. The code is like the practices, camp, training, etc...

My point is the lead dev for Angry Birds ends up at your desk and it seems almost pompous to say, "Where's your GitHub app?" This person broke his neck to ship, upgrade, and maintain a product that you can look at (the NBA game), yet a lot of people still seem to be saying, "w/o seeing your code (your practice sessions) I need the GitHub repo" (I need to watch you play at the park).

I guess as an employer this works to my advantage if more startups require GitHub accounts, since I can pick off proven talent that doesn't have this requirement. So yeah... it's a great idea! :-)

EDIT: And I should add that I was responding to someone who said that if you aren't working on something in your spare time that this is a red flag. So according to that poster, simply having great code from my "daytime" job isn't sufficient. Kobe Bryant NBA footage isn't sufficient. If he doesn't also play pickup games there must be a problem?!

It also breaks down because virtually no one in the NBA has only the NBA as their employer. At the very least they have sponsorships, many own businesses.. successful people just tend to be hustlers. Hustlers do lots of things.