Will the Euro Kill Minor League Basketball?

Brian ROSS
Sr. Editor, MLN Sports

BOCA RATON, FLA. - www.majorblogs.net - OPINION - High school basketball players take note: A second language may up your earning power as a pro.

Experts will tell you that a weak dollar is good for exports. While they were thinking beef and corn, someone obviously forgot what a strong Euro does to basketball.

The dilapidated dollar and the huge popularity of professional basketball overseas has created a sea of cash that rivals, or in some cases may exceed the NBA's treasure chest. 

Thanks to undersupervised banks running amok with home loans, and the costly military expeditions of the Bush Administration, the dollar is weak and looking to stay that way for some time.

Foreign leagues have deep pockets and the NBA owners are not the big kids on the global block anymore.

The result is that players can enjoy big paydays playing for teams in other countries. There are many players who will turn their noses up at the CBA, the IBL, and positively avoid the ABA simply because they can play for solid money backed by a currency that is holding its value, most often the Euro. 

Nature and professional basketball benches abhor a vacuum. Someone has got to fill those roster slots. If the NBA cannot get Yao Ming because he is playing for a higher bidder in Italy, then Eddie Yao from a D-League bench who shows some promise may be the go-to guy with some D-League training.  In turn, now that Eddie is not stock on the bench of the D-League club anymore, they may reach down to Wiley Wan-Abee on a CBA bench, who might have missed the D-League cut previously. 

Of course the CBA will need to cover their spot, so Dave Doufoos, who would have been lucky to grab a bench seat in the ABA, gets the nod. 

If you spend your day gainfully employed astounding the crowds with three card monte on 127th & Broadway and hustling some decent hoops at night, the boys with the Red White and Blue balls may be calling you to play in some corner of the US. 

How do you feel about wrestling the dancing bear?

The weak dollar is great for the players, horrible for U.S. clubs and their fans.

Now hold on, I can safely hear you minor league hoops honchos here in the states muttering as you're reading this. The overseas leagues have always been more salary advantageous than our domestic minor leagues. That's not news.

True enough. Players have turned down big checks to come and play in the USA, either because they do not adjust well to living overseas, or because they think that they have a better shot with the NBA scouts if they hang in for less jack in places where the scouts can drive or fly short distances to see them.

The problem is now that the NBA does not matter, at least where it counts to players and agents.

Basketball is a business. Players are mercenaries. Most have no allegiance to club or country. Most see salary as the prestige that matters.  The only colors they want to wear are the green and gold being deposited in their banks. 

The NBA has always had the cachet because the NBA has always had the cash.

Now the ACB, Serie A and others have the cash and are developig the pull. If the NBA cannot be competitive, and players seek out world clubs to get the bigger money that they feel that they deserve, they will go.

When Kobe Bryant, who owns 50% of the Milano club,  can contemplate a hypothetical $50 million payday from overseas basketball, and overseas signings are already nibbling away at the first benchers at NBA clubs, the only thing that may change the tide is if the dollar gets stronger.

Forget Commissioner Stern and the NBA owners. Basketball in the US largely rests in the hands of Ben Bernanke and the Fed.  Right now, with this group of policy makers, someone needs to send LeBron James the Italian edition of Rosetta Stone.

Quante costa di Nikes, yo?

Div II Players in the Land of Milk & Honey

Minor league players will prosper from the vacuum from the top, and the lack of players signing from overseas. The NBA D-League should prosper as well, as its benches will become more mission-critical in molding college athletes who did not quite gel in their school programs.

There is a lot of talent that has been untapped and unrefined in the USA because there has been such a glut of players and so few of the high paying positions for them to fill.

The draft may have to get a bit deeper, and the D-League may have to provide a bit better minor league salary to retain more of that second tier of top talent.

Commissioner Stern's nascent farm system will endure. Others may not be so lucky.

Surviving the Dollar and Housing Horrors

The CBA has been on its knees after Mr. Thomas bought it as a play toy and the D-League's acquisition of the stronger minor league clubs and  talent. The IBL has been able to operate opposite season and stay out of the fray.

The ABA is the most entry-level talent acquirer. To paraphrase the rat scarfing down the moldy block of bread in Ratatouille, once you get past the gag reflex a whole world of basketball talent opens up to you.  ABA fans watching now do not come to see prospects: They come to see pro basketball in their local arena on the cheap. This the ABA can deliver. Other leagues may be able to adapt to the changing econonmic climate as well.

The CBA and IBL, if careful, can benefit from a soft dollar and soaring inflation if they can provide live sports hoops afficianados in range of NBA venues still charging astronomical prices for tickets.  In smaller markets, particularly where the housing crunch is hitting hardest, or in the rust belt where jobs are going away again, there may be casualties.

Minor league clubs compete against HDTV, which for basketball provides a pretty decent, and usually low or no cost, hoops jones for the fan in need.  If the NBA puts a few more games on TNT and a few less games under subscription, it will have an effect on minor league basketball.

Ciao, Commisioner Stern!

Perhaps, instead of constantly seeking the long-lost love and affection of the NBA, the indy leagues wishing to survive should start seeking out affiliation deals with Spain, Italy, Turkey and Greece.

American players still form a deep pool for the growing demand for pro hoops world-wide. Since the NBA has not been able to expand that market under its own brand, pimping for the highest bidders from abroad may be a source of both cash and prestige for those sports clubs who have been long-ignored by the NBA.