Promotion and relegation: what if the NBA did it?

Post #1 » by **DelaneyRudd** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 4:53 am

For those of you unfamiliar with the idea:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promotion_and_relegation

Sorry Miami! Because you tanked Boise, Idaho gets to be in the big time this year! Oklahoma, you want a team? OK, build one from the D-League up.

While this is certainly NEVER goin to happen in a world of mega-million dollar franchises in North America what would happen if the NBA and the D-League went to this system? I think it would be great for the fans and horrible for the individual owners. No more tanking for players! We would still have the draft, only the worst team that got relegated will play their new star player in the D(B) league! Ha ha ha, sucks to be you Mr. One and Done.

OK, plenty of holes here, the NBA is moving more towards a MLB model than a Premier League model. But with the stagnation of old urban American centers like Pittsburgh or St. Louis and the growth of Western and Southern areas, we wouldn't have this do-si-doe of teams to other markets if every city just had a team that could become great if they step up to the task.

Don Draper · Post #2 » by **Don Draper** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 5:08 am

This would be a great idea.

But it would never work because of the collective bargaining agreement, sponsorship, and the lack of teams and leagues, etc.

But what if the promoted D-league teams? The Austin Toros in a playoff game vs the Houston Rockets...

SabasRevenge! · Post #3 » by **SabasRevenge!** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 5:46 am

DelaneyRudd wrote:For those of you unfamiliar with the idea:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promotion_and_relegation

Sorry Miami! Because you tanked Boise, Idaho gets to be in the big time this year! Oklahoma, you want a team? OK, build one from the D-League up.

While this is certainly NEVER goin to happen in a world of mega-million dollar franchises in North America what would happen if the NBA and the D-League went to this system? I think it would be great for the fans and horrible for the individual owners. No more tanking for players! We would still have the draft, only the worst team that got relegated will play their new star player in the D(B) league! Ha ha ha, sucks to be you Mr. One and Done.

OK, plenty of holes here, the NBA is moving more towards a MLB model than a Premier League model. But with the stagnation of old urban American centers like Pittsburgh or St. Louis and the growth of Western and Southern areas, we wouldn't have this do-si-doe of teams to other markets if every city just had a team that could become great if they step up to the task.

I absolutely agree. A while ago I proposed the same thing because I absolutely love the way the premier league works. A team like Miami could be seriously set back if they were relegated. The point about OKC is especially strong. They could have a franchise, but it wouldn't be in the top division of the NBA (20 teams?) They'd have to win their way into the highest division by assembling a strong and winning club.

The 15 player roster limit has to be done away with and the NBA needs a more flexible salary cap/rookie scale with how international basketball has become. At the very least each team should have one d-league team.

The biggest question for me is how do you maintain some level of competitive balance while at the same time allowing teams to go out and bring the best talent to the NBA? It's disappointing to know that only a few European football and basketball clubs even have a chance to come out on top.

How fun would an international tournament pitting all of the top teams against each other be? The Boston Celtics v. Barcelona, CSKA Moscow v. the NO Hornets. I'd tune in.

Post #4 » by **DelaneyRudd** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 6:15 am

See, but then if we get into doing away with the salary cap, draft and revenue sharing it will be a Laker Knick league and that would suck ass.

Nashty · Post #5 » by **Nashty** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 6:18 am

DelaneyRudd wrote:See, but then if we get into doing away with the salary cap, draft and revenue sharing it will be a Laker Knick league and that would suck ass.

Exactly, then you would only have equivalent teams to man u, chelsea, arsenal or liverpool as the only teams having a shot at the championship. Plus the premier league doesn't even have playoffs, which is (Please Use More Appropriate Word), so every team is out of it by december except for the top 2 or 3 teams.

Post #6 » by **DelaneyRudd** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 6:26 am

So that's why I can't find a Newcastle t-shirt. I figured I like the beer, might as well be my favorite Premier League team.

El Turco · Post #7 » by **El Turco** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 6:51 am

DelaneyRudd wrote:So that's why I can't find a Newcastle t-shirt. I figured I like the beer, might as well be my favorite Premier League team.

might wanna rethink that, they probably have the worst administration among PL teams. I wouldnt be surprised to see them in lower divisions in couple years.

As for the subject, D-League cant be the 2nd division. Whichever team gets promoted should be at least competitive in the highest division and none of the D-League teams capable of doing that.

Point forward · Post #8 » by **Point forward** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 8:04 am

Actually I would love that idea. Maybe the NBA would be better off if the bottom 2 clubs were forced to relegate to the NBDL. It is of course unrealistic (no owner would take this huge financial risk) and don't know how the NBA Draft would look like, but it would SURELY eliminate tanking.

Post #9 » by **DelaneyRudd** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 8:08 am

ElTurco wrote:
DelaneyRudd wrote:So that's why I can't find a Newcastle t-shirt. I figured I like the beer, might as well be my favorite Premier League team.

might wanna rethink that, they probably have the worst administration among PL teams. I wouldnt be surprised to see them in lower divisions in couple years.

As for the subject, D-League cant be the 2nd division. Whichever team gets promoted should be at least competitive in the highest division and none of the D-League teams capable of doing that.

Well of course not now. Hmm, so Newcastle has the Donald Sterlings of the PL. How about West Ham? I won't go for Arsenal or Chelsea. I am not a bandwagon fan.

Leslie Forman · Post #10 » by **Leslie Forman** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 8:55 am

DelaneyRudd wrote:See, but then if we get into doing away with the salary cap, draft and revenue sharing it will be a Laker Knick league and that would suck ass.

No, because the US is waywaywaywaywaywayway bigger and richer than England. Not too long ago a little small market team like Portland was able to have the biggest payroll in the NBA (and probably will again in the future). Even right now, the Mavs, and not the Knicks, have the biggest payroll. It's not the city that matters so much as the owners and management. Chelsea currently blows more money than any other team in the world except Real Madrid, and it's only because of some moneybags owner who wants to win titles. Before he came along, they weren't any richer than, say, Newcastle, who make tons of money and just blow it on crap players, like the Knicks.

CSKA Moscow is currently the best team in the Euroleague and they play in front of, what, 5000 people? Meanwhile we've got douchebags like Jerry Reinsdorf who make tons and tons of money from a big market basketball team, just to spend it all on his baseball team. A free market system will not make stupid or brilliant managing irrelevant.

Nashty wrote:Exactly, then you would only have equivalent teams to man u, chelsea, arsenal or liverpool as the only teams having a shot at the championship. Plus the premier league doesn't even have playoffs, which is (Please Use More Appropriate Word), so every team is out of it by december except for the top 2 or 3 teams.

In the last 25 years, eight teams have won an English Premiership title. In that same period, eight teams have won an NBA title. Hell, doesn't everybody say how much better basketball was in the '80s and early '90s? That entire period was dominated by three teams!

And I've always thought that the American system of having a playoff determine eveything was pretty stupid. You just played a 82 frickin games, and they meant absolutely nothing? Come on. There should at least be a separate title for winning the most games or something. Maybe it could be like the Champions League, where it goes on the same time as the regular season, and the teams are determined by the prior year's performance. It just seems ridiculous that all those 82 games are meaningless.

Apollo64 · Post #11 » by **Apollo64** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 11:08 am

Why take the Premier League as an example of "promotion and relegation" system, when about every national basketball league in Europe uses the same system?

The "promotion and relegation" system generally fosters competition and removes tanking as a serious consideration for teams, on the other hand, there is no salary cap and no draft, so the richer clubs come on top virtually every time. It's no fun watching the Greek basketball league for example and knowing beforehand that the finals are going to be between Panathinaikos and Olympiacos barring a miracle, because both teams have budgets that dwarf the ones of the next tier teams. Going back to the Premier League, the same four teams (Manchester Utd., Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool) are the ones who compete for the championship every year and have the qualifying spots for the Champion's League locked.

I think the NBA system is fine as it is, with its only issue being that there are no serious repercussions for tanking.

Alex_De_Large · Post #12 » by **Alex_De_Large** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 12:27 pm

it's a good idea because no one can dare to tank then.
You have 20 teams in NBA1 and 10 teams in NBA2, 16 teams from NBA1 reach the playoffs, the other 4 go to NBA2, and obviously from NBA2, 4 teams out of 10 come to NBA1 every year.

Post #13 » by **Basti** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 2:07 pm

there would be another problem IMO: since the NBA is a star driven league it would kill a team if (one of) their best player(s) would go down due to injury. in europe it is not that serious as in the nba because here the team usually has a better chance to compensate for that loss but in the NBA you can see that whenever your best player is out you have big troubles winning more than a couple of games.

bobcatsinfour · Post #14 » by **bobcatsinfour** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 4:33 pm

DelaneyRudd wrote:So that's why I can't find a Newcastle t-shirt. I figured I like the beer, might as well be my favorite Premier League team.

That might be the best reason I've ever heard for liking a team you don't know. I'm not even joking.

kandiking · Post #15 » by **kandiking** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 4:36 pm

Alex_De_Large wrote:it's a good idea because no one can dare to tank then.
You have 20 teams in NBA1 and 10 teams in NBA2, 16 teams from NBA1 reach the playoffs, the other 4 go to NBA2, and obviously from NBA2, 4 teams out of 10 come to NBA1 every year.

how do you handle the draft?

bobcatsinfour · Post #16 » by **bobcatsinfour** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 4:46 pm

kandiking wrote:
Alex_De_Large wrote:it's a good idea because no one can dare to tank then.
You have 20 teams in NBA1 and 10 teams in NBA2, 16 teams from NBA1 reach the playoffs, the other 4 go to NBA2, and obviously from NBA2, 4 teams out of 10 come to NBA1 every year.

how do you handle the draft?

Therein lies the problem, soccer teams in Europe don't have drafts. They have youth academies where they homegrow their players for several years. Good luck getting that to fly with the current CBA.

Post #17 » by **Shaazzam** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 4:53 pm

European leagues are comprised of clubs.

NA leagues are comprised of franchises.

It will never happen. By virtue of paying a franchise fee, NA teams have the rights to everything that being a franchise allows. Getting shunted to the minor leagues is not one of them.

SabasRevenge! · Post #18 » by **SabasRevenge!** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 5:33 pm

Shaazzam probably hit the nail on the head. There would have to be some pretty radical restructuring and I doubt the owners would go along with it.

As far as competitive balance is concerned, I didn't suggest doing away with the salary cap, but the NBA will need more flexibility to pay international players and possibly even to prevent top US players from bolting to a much bigger payday in Europe.

Rudy Fernandez could have signed for tax-free MLE money in Europe, but he chose to come over to the NBA. I wouldn't be surprised if there was some winking and handshaking, but how long will it be until a European club will be able to pay 10m per season instead of the rookie scale?

At the very least, the NBA needs to grow the DL, allow more cap flexibility and flexibility when signing rookies - just not Glenn Robinson disaster flexibility. NBA teams in international tournaments would be great as well.

BigOrangeBalls · Post #19 » by **BigOrangeBalls** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 5:57 pm

I love this idea.

The draft is the only problem I see. You can still keep the salary cap structure the way it is.

El Turco · Post #20 » by **El Turco** » Fri Jul 4, 2008 5:58 pm

DelaneyRudd wrote:Well of course not now. Hmm, so Newcastle has the Donald Sterlings of the PL. How about West Ham? I won't go for Arsenal or Chelsea. I am not a bandwagon fan.

by rooting West Ham you d be pissed since you d be losing your best players and young talents every transfer season. Go with Liverpool, they are always good enough to contend but havent won the ship in almost 20 years and they have the tradition and prestige. Much like Celtics up until this year.