D League Development?

[Kanyewest]

What if basketball players went straight from high school to the d-league as Mark Cuban proposed? Instead of having high school kids spend 1 year in school, they would have to spend 1 year in the d-league.

I agree that the Wizards are under utilizing the D-League option. The Wizards have been one of the worst teams in terms of their bench for most of the season, at least until they acquired Andre Miller. The Wizards would have a more sustainable way to have depth if they went forward with a d-league team.

I would be interested to know if D-League teams actually are profitable and what kind of revenues they create.

[badinage]

Seems to me a bold-thinking owner would do this:

1. Establish a D-League franchise that is a pipeline for his NBA team only
2. Hire a name college coach at a big salary -- like, $5-7 mil per. You wouldn't get a Pitino or Calipari, but maybe a Sean Miller.
3. Use the franchise to lure high schoolers who don't want (or can't get into) college

[daSwami]

There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of thought put into the D-League marketing-wise. They put a team in Santa Cruz for chrissakes. I lived in Santa Cruz - there is no more "sports apathetic" city in the country than Santa Cruz (unless surfing while stoned is a sport. They are pretty passionate about that.)

Idaho? Maine? Delaware? wut???

Why not put teams in "big" cities somewhat close to where NBA teams already are (e.g., Trenton, Richmond, Baltimore, Nashville, Pittsburgh, Austin ...); Or places with an existing basketball-friendly fan base (Raleigh-Durham, Seattle, Vancouver, St. Louis, San Diego, Kansas City, Louisville/Lexington ...).

[closg00]

There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of thought put into the D-League marketing-wise. They put a team in Santa Cruz for chrissakes. I lived in Santa Cruz - there is no more "sports apathetic" city in the country than Santa Cruz (unless surfing while stoned is a sport. They are pretty passionate about that.)

Idaho? Maine? Delaware? wut???

Why not put teams in "big" cities somewhat close to where NBA teams already are (e.g., Trenton, Richmond, Baltimore, Nashville, Pittsburgh, Austin ...); Or places with an existing basketball-friendly fan base (Raleigh-Durham, Seattle, Vancouver, St. Louis, San Diego, Kansas City, Louisville/Lexington ...).

Ahhh, because the casual fan, say one with a family, could opt to buy 4 tix to see D-League game instead of top-dollar to see an NBA game. The League is purposely set-up not to compete for NBA dollars, that is why the host cities are so obscure. Some of these D-League games (I think the Maine team), are well attended.
http://www.nba.com/dleague/news/nba_d_l ... 05_01.html

[ptptpt]

There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of thought put into the D-League marketing-wise. They put a team in Santa Cruz for chrissakes. I lived in Santa Cruz - there is no more "sports apathetic" city in the country than Santa Cruz (unless surfing while stoned is a sport. They are pretty passionate about that.)

Apparently the Santa Cruz Warriors sell out their stadium according to this Grantland article.

The Santa Cruz Warriors hold their business and basketball offices less than three miles from Kaiser Permanente Arena, where they sell out almost all of their home games, a rarity in the D-League.

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/doing ... gue-teams/

Why not put teams in "big" cities somewhat close to where NBA teams already are (e.g., Trenton, Richmond, Baltimore, Nashville, Pittsburgh, Austin ...); Or places with an existing basketball-friendly fan base (Raleigh-Durham, Seattle, Vancouver, St. Louis, San Diego, Kansas City, Louisville/Lexington ...).

Tulsa's team is about 90 minutes from OKC. Hell even the 87ers in Delaware is pretty favorably located even though its Philly's franchise it is also about 2 hours away from DC. They may not all be right now but I also figure if you have good marketing you can make basketball fans anywhere. Who woulda thought OKC would be as good of a fanbase as it is?

[jeffsays]

I'd like to see the Wizards get their own D-League team and have them play in Virginia Beach. It's a heavily populated area and was rumored to be a potential moving spot for the Kings a while back. It would also help spread the Wizards name down south.