RealGM

As some of you might know, I follow the D-league pretty closely.

I applaud the decision by Stern to affiliate he D-league with NBA teams and build a true minor league system. We've seen a host of players use the NBADL as a stepping-stone into the Association, and this season alone there has been a record twenty-two call-ups. More NBA teams are starting the trust the league, realizing the benefits of having a spot to send developing prospects who require some much needed playing time.

Still, the league is far from perfect. any chance for a player to learn continuity or a system pretty much goes out the window due to the incredible amount of roster turnover. New teammates come and go daily which means playing time is erratic, frustrating the players and coaches alike. The high turnover rate also makes it tough for coaches to game plan, which sometimes causes contests to resemble pickup ball at the YMCA.

The instability of the league is directly related to income. D-leaguers earn between 12,000 and 24,000 annually, which (believe it or not) is a significant increase from last season. Those salaries can't even begin to compete with Europe, where top tier American players can earn upwards of a million dollars. Many Americans who head overseas pull in at least six figures. Many D-leaguers jump ship and head overseas during the season, leaving their teams to scramble for replacements. scramble to find replacements. Sometimes D-league squads forced to fill their roster with guys who have no business being on the court with NBA caliber players. This results in poor competition for NBA assignees and a ton of lop sided victories and defeats.

Although the money is better in Europe, the same can

So your plan is to dump a bunch of money into the league? Good plan.

Very interesting post. I agree that the D league could be an asset to the NBA.

Maybe the 10 day contracts should just be a small bonus along with the player's D league salary.

I thought their plan was to eventually have one D-League team for every NBA team. (Which is why they were willing to allow the Lakers to actually own a team there). At least i think thats how it went, I'm really not sure.

Just searched for it and found the old article
http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=2414330

To me it sounds like that seems to be his ideal plan, to get every team to have one.

I would imagine the league loses money as it is. If there is one D-League team for every two NBA teams, each NBA team would be effectively responsible for six roster spots, or $540,000. Could you convince the NBA owners that they'll get 540k worth of development to their second rounders each year? Sounds to me like the price of having a second rounder just doubled.

If the NBA owners don't pay for this, who would?

I really don't see a need to have one D-League team per NBA team. I couldn't tell you off the top of my head how many call-ups have happened this year, but NBA teams almost never sign more than a couple D-Leaguers in a season (if that), and it doesn't seem like the maximum of two NBA guys per team being sent down at any one time needs to be massively expanded.

It seems like the current ratio should work OK given the personnel needs of NBA teams. I think the desire to have more teams is simply the NBA hoping they can eventually make money by bringing basketball to under-served markets.

You currently have 14 teams, and let's say 10 players from each team get an average of $50,000 raises--you could probably give it to fewer guys and still get to keep most of the good players, especially since the NBA players sent down are making $400k+ anyway.

That's $500k per team and $7 million for the entire league per year. I have no idea what the economics are of running a D-League team, but I assume it's already subsidized by the league. Is $7 million too much for the entire league? The the NBA could just unilaterally cancel Gadzs' salary and redistribute it to everyone in the D-League

The NBA also subsidizes the WNBA. How many loss leaders are the owners willing to embrace?

Here's a potential comprimise: Any D-league player with a cumulative 10 games NBA experience gets a minimum of $50k, with the difference (between that and 24k) paid by the NBA. Those numbers are just off the top of my head, but a concept like that would help to distinguish between the guys with "real" potential to get back in the league, without raising the salary for scrubs with no chance.

There's also that other category of players who went undrafted but still have the potential to make the NBA some day. Honestly, I think those guys should just go to Europe for two years and make more money.

What about a certain flat % of the luxury tax dollars going to the NBDL? I don't know what the total dollar amount over the lux tax the league was last year, but that money gets re-distributed among the other NBA teams correct?

How bout we ditch the WNBA and put all that back into the NBADL?

I would love it if every team had a squad. I wish there was an NBADL team in Madison for the Bucks.

Yeah there have been 17 different players and a total of 22 different call-ups (some players called up multiple times) this season, so team obviously value having bodies on demand. It's extremely rare for a team to bring in a player from overseas during the season because of buy out issues. Loren Woods was just released from his Turkish team because he (along with a few other American players) didn't want to travel to Serbia after the chaos there, so he came back to the states and ended up on a 10-day with the Houston Rockets. The Rockets also signed Mike Harris, who had been in China. Those are the only two cases that come to mind, and they both happened on the same team and within about a week span of one another.

The objective in pumping more money into the D-league would basically be an attempt to get the best players, which would have a number of useful benefits that I described in my initial post.

The target players would consist of-

1. The best undrafted rookies and training camp cuts
2 The best veteran players who play overseas but aim for an NBA career
3. Players who are released from NBA teams during the season

Again, the D-league could never compete with a club like Olyampiakos who can offer Lynn Greer 7 million over two years. But with competitive salaries the idea would be to keep the Lynn Greer's and Charlie Bell's of the world in the U.S for a few more years before they go overseas (if they don't make it to the NBA in that time period). Instead off trekking around to Russia and Poland, a guy like Greer should be able to earn a comfortable living in the states playing against the best borderline NBA players the world has to offer.

Young unproven rookies right out of college don't make mega-bucks overseas right away anyway. They make somewhere in the ballpark of 80-90k (around the same salaries the D-league should be offering). A ten-day contract here and there would push the yearly earning well above 100k (even more if the player has previous NBA experience).

Here is a great article from last year that talks about this issue. The player featured in the article, Lance Allred, coincidentally just signed his second ten day contract with the Cavs.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... Id=7239948

I was under the impression D-Leaguers made around 25-50K a season.

The D-League should make a farm team for every organization and put them close to the NBA team's home. Like the Bucks would be in Madison or Green Bay, the Bulls would be in Rosemont or Hoffman Estates, etc. Make it a true minor league.

I think that part of the concept of the D-league is to limit the amount of travel between cities. This keeps down expenses, reduces player wear and tear, and makes it easier for scouts to see multiple games.

oLd sKool

Chuck D wrote:Young unproven rookies right out of college don't make mega-bucks overseas right away anyway. They make somewhere in the ballpark of 80-90k (around the same salaries the D-league should be offering).

What do you mean the salary the D-League "should" be offering? Why should they get paid so well to play a game that doesn't attract fans or revenue?

You argue that the service they provide is being a stand-by replacement, but since that benefits all teams equally it doesn't help any particular team win more games (relative to competition), or earn additional revenue.

I said, "should" because my whole is that increased player salary would be of great benefit to both the D-league and NBA itself. In my opinion greater salary would greatly increase the talent pool in the d-league, which would make for a better product, which would make for more revenue.

I'm not going to get into the issue of professional athletes

"Stand by replacement" is a relative term. Rafer Altson was at one time "a stand by "replacement" but is now having a terrific season as a starter for one of the best teams in the league. Ask Spurs fans what Ime Udoka has meant to their team. We lose a lot of guys like Alston and Udoka to Europe every year.

Someone is going to pay these players anyway, but it's more beneficial to the NBA for them to be paid in Albuquerque than in Athens.