Hoops

Marquee players: imports vs locals

Interestingly if your marquee player is the biggest draw card and that happens to be an Aussie, then some restrictions on imports favours the concept of building on teams with local content.

The idea that a team in the NBL can have more than three imports or up to three is okay with me but do we really want to see more than three imports on the floor at once?

It's a balance, so the marquee should be just that (marquee), no matter where they are from, but I see that it is also crucial to keep as many local players as possible keen to come back and play here and for those already here to stay...

With you completely Isaac. I am concerned about sustainability and teams with less funding falling away competitively and that can lose fans, income and interest. Many other concerns like local economy, marketing from some club is poor and fan engagement as well.

KET, I imagine there were bigger team salary disparities last year. I'd guess that the top team spend twice what the bottom team spent.

I don't think superteams are ideal. NBA people talk about how the league is the most predictable of the major US leagues. Ideally each team would have one superstar, rather than some hoarding them.

It'd be best if each team had one drawcard (Randle, Ennis, Goulding, Childress, Harrington, those sorts of players) and then quality pieces, roleplayers, projects, rookies, etc. And I think the best mileage will generally come from marquee imports rather than the Australians who would sign for equivalent money. We're not going to get Mills, Bogut, Simmons, etc. It's going to be Bairstow, Maric, Newley - I'm not convinced they're drawcard players. By all means, encourage them to return home, but not if it makes it less appealing to spend up for Ennis-types.

KET

RE: 'Is this for when they're 36-40 years old?'

That is not the amounts they would be paid, those are the amount that under the marquee player rule would count towards the cap.

Those players can be replaced with any other marquee Aus/NZ/Asian player for the same result. But as I understand it there is nothing to stop a team enticing Bogut out of the NBA by matching his $13.8M salary, with only a maximum $300k counting towards the cap.

Blatche is also on $1.5 million a season over there too.

Blatche is on a 3 year deal in China

There is something to say in regards to keeping talented imports/Euro-level Aussies in the league, and in my opinion, on the same team. These days player movement, particularly import movement means very few stay beyond a year or two and it makes it hard to build that narrative, identity for clubs and something to market.

This also applies, but less so, to Australians on clubs. It's hard for people to care about a basketball team where they don't know who's on the team due to constant changes from year to year.

The average joe won't keep up, the occasional fan barely would and only those who pay attention intently (like us hoopsters) know who's playing for their NBL club. It makes it very tough to engage with the broader market and ultimately hurts growth in support, crowd and finances.

Admittedly part of the problem may simply be the fact that people move a lot these days in any job regardless of whether it is sports or business or whatever else and the sports issue being pursuit of greater goals in Europe or the NBA.

Mills ($250K) and Bogut ($300k)

Is this for when they're 36-40 years old?
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It seems ridiculous to have a team paying $1.7mill and not having to pay equalisation, I reason this on the basis that if you have one team paying $1mil to players and another paying $1.7mil then it's a far too large of a discrepancy for competitive basketball to be played by most/all sides and if a team isn't competitive for a long period they can lose crowd, sponsorship and money and end up bankrupt. The less teams around the worse it is for the overall league (especially if a major market like Adelaide leaves).

This is where the balance needs to come into play to allow power clubs to spend a bit more to help introduce those superstars into Australia, while putting a bit to equalisation so that other teams to remain competitive lifting the standard and star power of the league while keeping it within the realms of sustainability. Going to the crux of Isaac's reason for the thread, I think there's real benefit to pursue both import superstars like Childress/Randle while also pursuing top class Australians from Europe like Newley. That's why perhaps 2 marquee players is reasonable with one being restricted to Australians only, and requiring equalisation payments for both marquees and not allowing the cap to be exceeded except for marquee players.

Another option is that the third import must have played within Australasia during the off-season. Also maintains their identity and potentially brings in new fans from the ABL-level leagues.

I'd still love to have a rule for returning imports that helps encouraging those coming back.

Loved that Townsville brought back Conklin regardless of how that ended and hated how Clarke and Ennis were best two in the league and left after that season (if I remember correctly the whole All NBL all star 5 from that season left).

So if there is any exception for imports it should be on returning imports and only one per team ( teams can keep all three but only one should have money not going towards the cap). I also believe that in the case of say Gary Ervin that won league MVP and then moved around that the same exemption applies even if the Import didn't play for your team last season because at the end of the day I want to see naturalised Australians/New Zealanders and the way we are going only very few are even reaching a third year (think of Torrey Craig that said he won't be back after 2 seasons here).

What do others think of taking monies off the salary for returning imports going towards the cap?

Even if it's $50k it's atleast a bit more incentive to clubs to try and retain.

I think the Asian player rule is a bit of a waste of time. Any that strongly identify as Chinese or Filipino etc will play in their local leagues. Melbourne being able to have Goulding as a marquee, Holt as their Asian player and then three imports is getting a bit silly.

Someone mentioned Andray Blatche, but if he's affordable, you can use an import spot on him. Surely the advantage is in having an Asian player that the Asian markets identify as Asian?!

Bit of a half-baked idea for the contract values would be to have every contract offer to a player run through the NBL. The highest contract on offer at the time a player signed (either that contract or another) would count as their market value. The player could accept any live contract and it would be binding. There'd be an allowance for relocation to stop clubs abusing it or players having legitimate reasons not to move.

So, Shaun Bruce gets offered $70k by Brisbane and $90k by Perth. Whichever he chooses, his market value is $90k. If he's offered $70k by Cairns and $90k by Brisbane, maybe the relocation buffer ($20k maybe) comes into play and his market value remains $70k.

They already do something unofficial and vaguely like this in determining amounts owed to sacked players who get a new contract.

Anyway, I did say it was half-baked...

I am guessing that overspending on restricted players (imports) is where the league equalisation rules will come in with the soft cap.

If imports were able to be marquee players, no one would ever bust the cap:

Local (Marquee #1): $150k (paid $200k)
Import 1 (Marquee 1): $200k (but paid $300k)
Import 2 (Marquee 2): $250k (but paid $450k)
Import 3 (Marquee 3): $300k (but paid $600k)
Local: paid $50k
Local: paid $50k
Locals x5 under $400k: paid $100k

Equals actual payments of $1.75M but for salary cap purposes it comes out to $1.1M and is under the cap (therefore no equalisation payments are made).

With the exact same team under these Marquee rules as disclosed you get:

Import 1: $600k
Import 2: $450k
Import 3: $300k

Local (Marquee 1): $150k (but paid $200k)
Local: paid $50k
Local: paid $50k
Locals x5 under $400k: $100k

Equals actual payments of $1.75M with $1.7M counting towards the cap. Therefore equalisation payments will follow.

Conversely, there is reason to try to encourage teams to convince Newley ($150k), Bairstow ($200k), Mills ($250K) and Bogut ($300k) to come play as your marquees. Even then, the $900k of payments to them that will count under the cap will probably prevent you from getting any imports given you still need to sign 7 more players and you have probably actually spent several million on just four players.

The above would seem to be a reasonable justification for the rule to me. How else could the equalisation rules work if imports were Marquee players?

I'm assuming the market rate for a player is simply what they're being paid because that's usually the most indicative, the only exceptions being if the player rejected a bigger offer (therefore playing under market price although other teams could manipulate it by disingenuously offering giant contracts) or if they say they're being paid $X amount but with some underhanded dealings are actually being paid more.

I think they've gone crazy with the marquee rule, and touching on another thread on this site, I think the new rules allow for teams like Perth, NZ, Melbourne, Sydney (now) to overspend and make other teams (Cairns, Wollongong, Townsville, perhaps Adelaide) either forced to spend themselves to bankruptcy or be noncompetitive.

There is a balance between needing to spend to succeed in business, which is fine ie Sixers with Randle, and spending to the point of pushing the standard up to a wildly unsustainable level (potentially getting to that point with the new measures). When you've got 9 teams, or 8 if Townsville aren't capable of lifting its standards to a reasonable point, I think the best balance is a cap designed to allow for each team to have a strong import and Australian on each team (ie, Randle/DJ, Lisch or Childress/Kazzouh, Jackson/Goulding, Import/EuroAussie).

If half the league have multiple star imports and star aussies, and the other half have average imports and aussies, this league won't work. We aren't in a position to shed any more teams than Townsville.

In saying that, I absolutely do encourage the ambition to have strong Australians and iconic, impressive imports (III) on each team. We definitely want a strong league to draw in the crowds and help develop aussie talent, and the importance of bringing strong aussies back is the parochial aspect of Australia.

Personally, I think:

» $1mil soft cap
» 1 or 2 marquee spots (max 1 for imports)
» Luxury tax for marquee payments
» Minimum $X amount spent on 4 players to ensure strong minimum wages for players
» Player wages to be judged by an independent panel to be included in the salary cap (does 2 things, firstly gets around regulations preventing publishing of real figures, and secondly prevents clubs getting away with publishing outrageously low contracts and hiding under the table type payments)
» Max 3 imports
» Allow an Asian player outside of the import restriction

Obviously a lot of the above is implemented by LK and I adopted and support those measures. I think those measures allow for bringing in strong Australian talent from Europe and bringing in those fringe NBA/ex NBA players just so long as they aren't completely stacked on four clubs, otherwise it drives up the costs by double for teams to compete if the talent is twice as high on other clubs.

I thought that was really odd too.

For most people who have attended a Nationals the battle is regularly for 2nd. The Vics (normally Vic Metro) having 1st place locked up.

This is further supported by performances at Junior Tournaments such as Eltham Australia Day, Norwood Easter, and National Junior Classics in June.

Last week the ASC produced figures showing basketball was now the biggest sport in Victoria in regards to registered players.

The AFL also has a dominance by Victoria but handle their Junior Tournament differently to basketball.

While basketball doesn't need to go to the extreme of a two-tier competition as it is actually played nationally maybe basketball could learn a lesson from AFL.

While SA and WA are known footy strongholds the AFL still do not break up these states as Metro and Country teams but rather as acutal state teams.

Is there a lesson here to learn for basketball? Should BA make a change to the structure of Junior Nationals and return SA and WA to state teams and not Metro/Country teams?

NSW may be big enough participation wise to remain Country/Meto.

Queensland while not having huge numbers has a pretty even participation from North Queensland all the way south of Brisbane and a single side may be too difficult to manage.

Combining SA Metro and Country would produce a much deeper team that would compete with the Vics at all levels of junior basketball. On the other side it also reduces the opportunities to play at this level.

In my opinion it certainly would make every national a much closer and open contest.