NBA looking into expanding with 5 European franchises in the next 10 years (1 Viewer)

zorro37

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http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/writers/ian_thomsen/02/13/international.expansion/index.html
:lol:
If you were an NBA fan in the UK or Ireland it's hard not to laugh.
NBA opens office in London. NBA has preseason game in London. That's a good start.

They then let the largest sport's broadcaster in the UK ditch it's basketball altogether. Now, all we get is one night a week, an hour long highlight package of the game of the week, on the satellite version of the least watched terrestrial channel.

This is far too premature. The game is absolutely huge in mainland Europe, but Britain's own basketball league averages about 1000 supporters a week to it's games. The London franchise plays in a tiny arena with a capacity of 300. Now they might be moving them to a 20, 000 arena and expect decent attendances 41 times a year?

Rome, Madrid, Paris, or eastern Europe would accomodate a team, maybe, in the next 2 or 3 decades. Unless they do something drastic, London shouldn't really be considered IMO.
 
The bigger problem i'd imagine would be the diluting of talent.The game really suffered during the expansion push of the 90's and it really hurt the product. They're just now getting the relative talent levels back up to a high level.
 
>>The bigger problem i'd imagine would be the diluting of talent.The game really suffered during the expansion push of the 90's and it really hurt the product. They're just now getting the relative talent levels back up to a high level.

Maybe, maybe not. Though it's a different styled game in Europe, there are plenty of great players in the Greek, Italian, etc. leagues from which the NBA could add excellent talent. I'm not sure whether it would or would not work in London (e.g. Vancouver) but it's certainly possible that there is enough enthusiasm in Europe to pull off adding a few more teams.

TPS
 
The logistics dont make sense unless you add atleast 3 teams at one time. You cant a have a team based in the U.S. fly to Europe for just one game against one team.
 
Maybe, maybe not. Though it's a different styled game in Europe, there are plenty of great players in the Greek, Italian, etc. leagues from which the NBA could add excellent talent. I'm not sure whether it would or would not work in London (e.g. Vancouver) but it's certainly possible that there is enough enthusiasm in Europe to pull off adding a few more teams.

TPS

The NBA already adds the excellent talent from Europe. Those guys enter the draft and get drafted. Maybe there's some that remain in Europe because they don't want to leave home, but the allure of the NBA and it's riches probably nets most of the top European talent to the States. What this could do is open up more opportunity for sub-par talent like that hanging around in the NBADL. But this would be watering down the level of talent and possibly hurting the product. The NBA should not expand.
 
Sorry Oklahoma City, you get passed over for Madrid and Athens. Better luck next time stealing a team. :)
 
The NBA already adds the excellent talent from Europe. Those guys enter the draft and get drafted. Maybe there's some that remain in Europe because they don't want to leave home, but the allure of the NBA and it's riches probably nets most of the top European talent to the States. What this could do is open up more opportunity for sub-par talent like that hanging around in the NBADL. But this would be watering down the level of talent and possibly hurting the product. The NBA should not expand.


I agree most of the top-talent from Europe is already here. I really don't see how adding ANY team is a good idea right now. The talent level seems to have finally caught up from the 90's expansion boom and now the league wants to basically start it all over again?!? GREAT IDEA!!

As for the travel aspect that some bring up I don't really think it's that big of a deal. These guys are traveling in private planes, it's not like they will be flying coach with their knees up to their chest for several hours at a time.
 
Five more teams I won't watch.
 

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