NBA Commissioner Adam Silver met with the media ahead of the NBA Paris Games and confirmed the league still has interest in developing a separate European League, that wouldn’t be as an expansion of the NBA itself.
In his most detailed comments on the matter to date, Silver thinks there is money and growth being left on the table by the Euroleague and thinks the NBA can step in.
“While Europe continues to develop some of the very 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,” Silver said.
“And what we do at the NBA is we run leagues. We, of course, run the WNBA, we have the [Basketball Africa League], we have the G League, we have a 2K video league. So we operate five different leagues and we think it’s an expertise we have. And 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.”
He also confirmed that NBA franchises are not top of mind.
“We might eventually have NBA franchises here, but it’s not our priority right now,” Silver said. “That’s not something we’re discussing at the moment. We’d need supersonic jets to make it work.”
Silver went on to say it’s not going to be something that league rushes into and wants to do everything correctly and properly.
“We’re moving slowly to ensure that anything we do is accepted by the existing basketball ecosystem,” Silver said. “We’ve been having direct conversations with stakeholders this week. We want to respect the traditions of European sports, no matter what direction we take.
“We’re talking about a competition – probably an independent league separate from the NBA. It would be a European league. What form it takes is still being explored. We’re speaking with various groups to understand what opportunities exist.”
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