“While Europe continues to develop some of the best players in the world, many of our most recent MVPs, of course, are European, we think that the commercial opportunity has not kept pace with the growth of the game,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in January of a potential NBA-affiliated league in Europe. “What we do at the NBA is we run leagues. We, of course, run the WNBA; we have the league in Africa I mentioned; we have the G League; and we have a 2K video league, so we operate five different leagues, and we think it’s an expertise we have.
“So we are looking very closely to see if there’s an opportunity to professionalize the game to another level here, to create a larger commercial opportunity.”
Thursday, the NBA board of Governors will hear more about those plans in detail, according to multiple reports. Silver is not seeking a formal vote from the owners but is seeking guidance to move forward with the discussions. Nothing is yet official, but the plan is picking up steam.
The plans for the new league include:
• There could be between eight and 16 teams, some existing and some new. It could launch as early as 2026, although it likely is later than that.
• This league would be a direct challenge to the existing EuroLeague structure. According to The Athletic, there is potential interest from four existing EuroLeague teams: Real Madrid, Barcelona, Fenerbahce (from Istanbul), and ASVEL (the team from Lyon, France, where Tony Parker is president).
• The league would have new “permanent” teams, and potentially, there would be a chance for some clubs to play their way into the league in a sort of promotion system (not unlike the current EuroLeague model).
• New teams would be a 50/50 owned proposition with the league and new investors, including sovereign wealth funds (which are limited in how much they can invest in an NBA team).
• The buy-in for those teams would be around $500 million.
• This is a partnership between the NBA and FIBA, the latter of which has been trying to break the EuroLeague’s current grip on the top teams.
• The goal is to ultimately have teams in major cities around the globe, often tied to major European soccer clubs. Markets mentioned include London, Manchester, Berlin and Munich. For example, Qatar Sports Investments could own a new team in Paris, tied to its soccer powerhouse Paris Saint-Germain, the Athletic reports.
The goal behind all this is money — both expanding the NBA brand and bringing in new revenue to the league. While the domestic market is still the primary revenue driver for the NBA, especially with the new television deal kicking in, the biggest growth opportunities for the league are international.
While they will have questions, it’s difficult to imagine NBA owners telling Silver anything other than to go forward with this effort — there are no real downsides for them at this point.