monsterpile wrote:AbeVigodaLive wrote:monsterpile wrote:AbeVigodaLive wrote:thedoper wrote:AbeVigodaLive wrote:This is the new NBA... 24/7... 365 days per year... news cycles that are a goldmine for the NBA and for players' branding efforts.
This will definitely dragged out with leaks from James' camp to fan the flames here and there.
It is what it is at this point.
When the game is this one-sided we need something to talk about. Our commitment to this board speaks loudly about how entertaining non-relevant basketball talk can be. People here talked wolves through 14 years of losing and a good number of the posters here want to go back to the good ole days when we were "developing". The basketball talk has become as entertaining as the game, which has been problematic for me personally. But it's never been more profitable or popular.
Exactly.
The NBA has stolen the NFL model of making a previous seasonal sport a year-round news maker.
It helps A LOT when your best player is able to pick his destination every year. Imagine if Tom Brady or Aaron Rodgers was able to pick where they were going every couple offseasons. It's really rare an actual franchise QB is able to do that in the NFL and that's just one piece of what keeps the NBA interesting in comparison to the NFL.
Sure. And it's why even though I think there are inherent dangers (especially for teams like MN) in the shorter NBA contracts... I think we can expect to see more of them.
More player movement... or rumors of player movement = more publicity/money for the league.
It also depends on if players (espcially the top guys) think they can keep getting more money with the rising cap that's certainly been a big driver of these shorter deals.
Meanwhile the NFL doesn't even have guaranteed contracts (Kirk Cousins is a pioneer!!!) but those NFL guys are trying to lock in as much guaranteed money as they possibly can because literally their career could be over one way or another in months or a couple years. An NBA player of reasonably healthy can still make millions (or a pretty good living) playing in another league if they want to. That opportunity isn't really there as much for NFL players. The talent gap between random player coming into the league and player X who is 27 or whatever (and maybe hasn't even made much money yet) sometimes isn't that big. It's a different sport and the NFL sure has been successful marketing their league although certainly there have been some bad instances. Those 2 leagues have really gotten a lot of mileage out of the year around thing with other leagues lagging pretty far behind.
Yeah, it's interesting because as you mention the career paths in the two leagues are so vastly different.
"Next man up" is more than a mantra in the NFL. It's big business and part of the gladiator culture we've come to know and expect. It might even be why player individuality has been traditionally stomped in the NFL. These guys only have 16 games and there are no guarantees they'll be around next week... or next game. Or even... the next play.
The NBA's entire resurgence was about more than teams and locales. It was about individuals. Bird (white) and Magic (black). Jordan. And now James... with some others in there, obviously.
We've learned that fans will now follow those players wherever they go. Team allegiance is largely provincial in world that's become infinitely smaller with technology.