Brotherly Love?

Does the NBA need to contract the league? Some avid basketball fans would say no, but I really believe that if they don’t contract then the league will fall through eventually. Let us start with the realization that the NBA has become a pick up game. All the stars want to go and pair with their buddies and play with a loaded team. You had Lebron and Chris Bosh team up with Dwayne Wade, Blake and CP3 team up and Deron Williams is going to go somewhere to play with another star. By making a set of super teams does it really help the league? No not in the current format.

Only 8 teams last year were profitable when it was all said and done. Yes I did say 8, not 8 in each conference, 8 total. Not Milwaukee or Sacramento or the Pistons. The attendance is at an all time low right now. Detroit for instance averages 13, 344, and just to put it into perspective when Michigan played Oakland University at the Palace, the attendance was 17,000. With just that stat alone it shows that people really don’t care about professional basketball.

Why don’t people have the passion for basketball as they once did? Well to start the game is filled with teenagers who think they are all that. Of the All-star starters only Chris Paul had played more than 2 seasons in college. The game has a youth movement and it has really become more selfish. That also goes with the ego of players growing, which society plays a factor in that. The other big reason is that all the skilled players team up.

When Dwight Howard becomes a free agent this summer, he will not look at Golden State, Charlotte, Utah or Portland. He will look at New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and Miami. He wants to win a championship, but also wants to be with other superstars. There is no parity in the game today. Let us look at the top 3 seeds in each conference, Chicago (Boozer, Rose), Miami(James, Wade, Bosh) and Philly(Andre, Elton Brand). In the west, OKC(Westbrook, Durant), LA Clippers (Paul, Griffin, Jordan) and San Antonio (Duncan, Parker). All of these teams have more than one superstar and these are the teams that players look to go to.

If I was running the NBA I would condense the league down to 20 teams, or make a cap on players so the top players can’t team up. If the league keeps the structure it currently has, I think the game will keep going down the tube.