Is it time for the NBA to expand?

[Chargers Jazz Angels]

With all the money and players that are out there is it time to expand the NBA to 32 teams.

This is how I would do it.

- put the new teams in Seattle and Kansas City.
- move Memphis to the east
- get rid of the separation of east and west. More on that later
- have an expansion draft prior to the regular draft. Each team can only hold 9 players. All others are available to be taken by the expansion teams. Including up coming RFA (expansion team would have right to match offers)
- upon a coin flip the expansion teams would get picks 1 and 2 in the draft then the lottery would determine picks 3,4 and 5.
- they would then have a lot of money to spend on free agents the following free agency period.

- with this said the nba would have 3 round draft
- each team would be required to have a gleague team. More on this latter

- the nba would have 2 conference with 4 divisions of 4 teams each.
- every team makes the play offs. If you win your division you would guarantee a first round home court advantage.
- seeding is based solely on record no longer separated by conference.
(Creating interesting first round match ups with teams 8vs9 and 7vs10)
- every team plays each other twice home/away. 62 games. Then every one in your division 2 more times. 6 more games then every one in your conference once alternating home/away each year. 12 more games. Total games 80 games.

Gleague
- 10% of the current cap would apply to spending in the gleague.
Example : (for demonstration purposes only)

Nba salary cap
100 million
120 million hard cap
60 million spending floor

Gleague
10 million
12 million hard cap
6 million min spending

Contracts signed in the gleague can be restructered if the gleague player makes the nba roster or is called up.

Nba teams can only call up players from their own gleague team. If there is a player on another gleague team that an nba team would want to call up or something a trade would have to be taken into account.

Any way couldn't sleep last night and was thinking about this between bouts of insomnia.

Curious who would be the 9 players you would protect?
Who would teams target from other teams.



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[7StraightIsGreat]

I'd love to see Seattle get a team back. Utah had a pretty fun history with the Supersonics. That being said, with the way superstars are teaming up, I worry about the middle-to-bottom of the league getting too watered down. Adding two teams to the league would only make that worse. It is a fun topic to discuss however.

 

[fishonjazz]

I'd love to see Seattle get a team back. Utah had a pretty fun history with the Supersonics. That being said, with the way superstars are teaming up, I worry about the middle-to-bottom of the league getting too watered down. Adding two teams to the league would only make that worse. It is a fun topic to discuss however.

Pretty much this.
I see pros and cons to the idea. Definitely interesting. Right now I lean yay

 

[♪alt13]

Dude you just barely complained about the local media regurgitating JF content and them not giving you any credit. Yes I read that same article about this on SLC dunk.

To the point no I don't think that they will. No American city makes long term financial sense for expansion. They would be splitting tv revenue 32 ways instead of 30. With the finals ratings being the highest ever this year and the NBA locked into a 10 year TV deal. It just doesn't make sense to expand.

Europe would make some sense longterm as it is opening up a huge new market but it would be a gamble and big change. They would probably need 6 teams to make it work (100+ new players), cut out of conference games to 1, increase the number of in division games, extend the length of the season, play many EC playoff games in the afternoon on the weekend, and hope that Europe starts supporting the NBA on a similar level to Americans. So that's probably not happening either.

Seattle may get the sonics back but it will be through relocation if it happens. My guess for the current Top candidates would be Hawks, Pellies, Nuggets.

 

[Gameface]

I think the NBA should shrink. If superstars make teams you need to at least have one superstar per team. 20 teams might be too many.

 

[Saint Cy of JFC]

An expansion draft would be great to help kill the Warriors. Each team gets to protect 2 players, the rest are eligible to get drafted by the new team. Goodbye Thompson and Green.

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[Saint Cy of JFC]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/fansided.com/2017/06/09/expansion-draft-seattle-nba/amp/

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[The Midnight]

An expansion draft would be great to help kill the Warriors. Each team gets to protect 2 players, the rest are eligible to get drafted by the new team. Goodbye Thompson and Green.

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Yup. This.

 

[♪alt13]

An expansion draft would be great to help kill the Warriors. Each team gets to protect 2 players, the rest are eligible to get drafted by the new team. Goodbye Thompson and Green.

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Pretty sure it's still 8.

 

[7StraightIsGreat]

An expansion draft would be great to help kill the Warriors. Each team gets to protect 2 players, the rest are eligible to get drafted by the new team. Goodbye Thompson and Green.

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Only being able to protect 2 players is lunacy. Also, during past NBA expansion drafts, every time a team loses a player, they're allowed to remove a guy from the list. So even with that model, GSW loses one of those guys, but not both.

 

[Hekate]

What about having bottom 8 team and 2 new teams forming a 2nd League? Winner of the 2nd league gets the top pick and advances with the 2 other teams while bottom 3 of NBA get relegated to 2nd League.

There are obvious shortcomings. Like who would watch a second league and 10 team schedule will probably be too short. But may prevent tanking and reward teams trying to win.

 

[7StraightIsGreat]

Pretty much this.
I see pros and cons to the idea. Definitely interesting. Right now I lean yay

I'm slightly confused. You agree that expansion would further water down the product but you'd be in favor of it?

 

[Miggs]

No. Not yet. Within a year or two, we'd complain the league is too watered down.

I do feel like we're starting to see more and more young, high-level talent coming into the league. I'd guess this is because the kids, for the most part, treat the sport at such a young age very professionally, and try to improve their craft. The AI era has passed. So it can definitely happen.

That said, with a likely lockout coming in the next half decade imo, the time is not now. I think in 5-7 years, once that lockout has passed, and certain populations in cities have grown and stabilized, making the product even more viable there, the time would be right. Seattle (14th largest tv market), Tampa/St. Pete (13th largest and far enough away from Orlando which in and of itself has a large enough market), St. Louis (21st largest market and just lost the Rams), and Pitt (23rd), and San Diego (28th and just lost the Chargers) each make a lot of sense to me. I'd probably go with Seattle (got jobbed) and St. Louis. Tampa would scare me because of how it could affect Orlando, Pitt would scare me because that's a football/hockey town and it could also affect Cleveland post-Lebron very badly, and San Diego isn't quite as large a market as the other two I selected and is just a very laid back, non-sports type of town to begin with.

 

[MVP]

Canada needs one more team, simple as that.

 

[Saint Cy of JFC]

Only being able to protect 2 players is lunacy. Also, during past NBA expansion drafts, every time a team loses a player, they're allowed to remove a guy from the list. So even with that model, GSW loses one of those guys, but not both.

Yeah, either way, it would be a good mechanism for breaking up the Warriors.

 

[Saint Cy of JFC]

No. Not yet. Within a year or two, we'd complain the league is too watered down.

I do feel like we're starting to see more and more young, high-level talent coming into the league. I'd guess this is because the kids, for the most part, treat the sport at such a young age very professionally, and try to improve their craft. The AI era has passed. So it can definitely happen.

That said, with a likely lockout coming in the next half decade imo, the time is not now. I think in 5-7 years, once that lockout has passed, and certain populations in cities have grown and stabilized, making the product even more viable there, the time would be right. Seattle (14th largest tv market), Tampa/St. Pete (13th largest and far enough away from Orlando which in and of itself has a large enough market), St. Louis (21st largest market and just lost the Rams), and Pitt (23rd), and San Diego (28th and just lost the Chargers) each make a lot of sense to me. I'd probably go with Seattle (got jobbed) and St. Louis. Tampa would scare me because of how it could affect Orlando, Pitt would scare me because that's a football/hockey town and it could also affect Cleveland post-Lebron very badly, and San Diego isn't quite as large a market as the other two I selected and is just a very laid back, non-sports type of town to begin with.

Nah, I dont think so. Right now you are seeing pretty good solid free agents not even able to get much more than the minimum. The NBA could definitely add at least 1 more team (obviously Seattle, not even a question). The 2nd should be Mexico City.

 

[fishonjazz]

I'm slightly confused. You agree that expansion would further water down the product but you'd be in favor of it?

I'd love to see Seattle get a team (like you) but I worry about the league being watered down. It's an interesting discussion. Right now I'm leaning yay.

 

[7StraightIsGreat]

I'd love to see Seattle get a team (like you) but I worry about the league being watered down. It's an interesting discussion. Right now I'm leaning yay.

Definitely agree on Seattle but I'd rather see a current team relocate. The way I look at 2 team expansion is like this: Sure the 2 teams could add some pretty decent players via expansion draft, and they would obviously be major free agent players right outta the gate, as well as getting the top 2 picks in the first year. My concern is less for the expansion teams and more about the fact that overall, you're going to see 30 G-Leaguers get promoted to the NBA.

Obviously, you'll end up seeing a couple of those guys turn out to be really good players that are diamonds in the rough but IMO, you're probably putting 25-to-28 guys into the league that are going to struggle and/or live on the end of the bench.

 

[Miggs]

Nah, I dont think so. Right now you are seeing pretty good solid free agents not even able to get much more than the minimum. The NBA could definitely add at least 1 more team (obviously Seattle, not even a question). The 2nd should be Mexico City.

Because the cap barely moved. And the same will basically be happening next year.

As soon as you bring two new teams into the fold, some of these teams will become even less competitive.

 

[Miggs]

Nah, I dont think so. Right now you are seeing pretty good solid free agents not even able to get much more than the minimum. The NBA could definitely add at least 1 more team (obviously Seattle, not even a question). The 2nd should be Mexico City.

Because the cap barely moved. And the same will basically be happening next year.

As soon as you bring two new teams into the fold, some of these teams will become even less competitive.