If you are ready to have a good laugh, LaVar Ball announced that he is starting his own basketball league for kids coming out of high school who don’t want to go to college.
This is not a joke, this is serious. The league will be
called Junior Basketball Association and will be supported by Big Baller Brand.
According to Lonzo, his father has been seriously working on the idea of the
league for months. Because we all know
that a few weeks prep time is all that is needed to set up, organize and run a
professional sports league.
Needless to say, he plans on 10 teams and wants to play
the games in the NBA arenas in LA, Dallas, Brooklyn and Atlanta. Does anyone actually believe that the NBA and/or NBA
team owners will allow a competing league to rent out their arenas? I am honestly asking because this league is basically competing with the NBA's G-League. He
anticipates 80 players and they will be paid $3,000-10,000 a month, which should be another concern for LaVar because he could be looking at paying out $400,000-500,000 in salary to the players alone each month.
I held on to this story
for a couple of weeks because I promised not to do any more Ball family stories
through the end of the year so by now he probably has the uniforms designed,
the high school gyms rented, and the league rules written out on a napkin. He
already has the league logo designed and to nobody’s surprise it is Lonzo’s silhouette.
Regardless of what can be said about LaVar, if he's serious about actually paying the players I'd say good on him.
ReplyDeleteNow that the NBA is using the G-League properly as a development league they should go the route of the MLB. Teams should be able to draft high school kids and bring them up through the G-League like baseball’s minor league.
DeleteIgnoring his antics, this is actually a great idea and sorely needed. Right now kids who can't go to college or just don't want to risk their career for nothing are basically forced to go to Europe or China or are forced into not playing at all for a year. The idea you put forth in reply to Zippy is prohibited by the NBA.
ReplyDeleteYes, there would need to be a rule change to remove the 1year requirement after high school. That is why I suggested the NBA use the G-League as baseball uses the minor leagues.
DeleteGreat. I'm keeping my students as far away from this post as possible.
ReplyDelete