Since Lebron hopped to Miami and Howard moving to the Lakers, there have been lots of comments about how the "new" era of super teams is destroying the NBA. If you look back at the history of the four major professional sports leagues in America, the NBA has far fewer champions over the last 30 years than the NFL, MLB, and NHL. Looking at the last 30 championships, the NBA has only had 9 different teams win an NBA title. 76ers, Celtics (3), Lakers (8), Pistons (3), Bulls (6), Rockets (2), Spurs (4), Heat (2), Mavs That's it. Only 9 teams over a whole generation of NBA fans. Compare that to the following leagues: NFL - 15 different teams (Redskins, Raiders, 49ers, Bears, Giants, Cowboys, Packers, Broncos, Rams, Ravens, Patriots, Bucs, Steelers, Colts, Saints) MLB - 19 different teams (Dodgers, Cardinals, Orioles, Tigers, Royals, Mets, Twins, A's, Reds, Blue Jays, Braves, Yankees, Marlins, Diamondbacks, Angels, Red Sox, White Sox, Phillies, Giants) NHL - 16 different teams (Islanders, Flames, Oilers, Canadians, Rangers, Stars, Avalanche, Devils, Lightning, Hurricanes, Ducks, Red Wings, Penguins, Blackhawks, Bruins, Kings) So just in championships, far fewer teams have won one in the NBA than the other sports. Let's look a little wider at the NBA. Of the other 21 teams that have not won a championship, how many had a realistic shot at winning one over let's say at least a 2-3 year span? Portland (early 90s) with Drexler and maybe in the early 2000s with Wallace Phoenix (late 90s) with Barkley Knicks (early to mid-90s) with Ewing Kings (late-90s to early 2000s) with Webber Utah (90s) with Malone & Stockton Orlando (mid-90s with Shaq & Penny) and a few years ago with Howard Sonics early 90s with Kemp & Payton Bucks (mid-80s with Moncrief) OKC today with Durant I'm not including (although all of these teams were pretty frisky): Pacers (mid-90s with Miller) Cleveland (early 90s with Daugherty & Price or late-2000s with Lebron) Charlotte Hornets (mid-90s with Mourning and LJ) Minnesota (late-90s with Garnet) Nets (early 2000s with Kidd) Hawks (late 80s early 90s with Wilkins) That's only 17 teams over the last 30 years who either won a championship or were really good over a 2-3 year span. So it's not unusual in the NBA for 20 teams to go into a season with zero hope of winning the championship.
There's a difference between 20 teams having no current hope of winning a championship and 20 teams never having any hope of winning a championship. Superstars will not play our their career in small market non glamorous cities anymore, so why should those fans stick around and buy tickets? Just forget about the NBA until the Finals roll around once a year or maybe catch the occasional game on TNT if it's a marque match up.
What about the spurs or the thunder? If teams put good teams together people will have no problem going there or staying there. When did stars flock to miami? They went there because they had a chance to win. Why did tmac force a trade to houston because we had yao and a chance to win.
I think it's fairly obvious that the NBA has too many teams. I don't know how the other leagues are able to achieve the level of parity they've had over the years and why the NBA can't seem to do the same. Are the elite players much more important to winning in basketball than in other sports? Or do the other leagues have better mechanisms in place to ensure that the elite players are evenly distributed throughout the league? As an aside, I'd actually be interested in seeing how many teams have actually been profitable over the past 30 years. That could shed some light on why the issue on parity has not been actively pursued.
Going into this season, I would say at most 10 teams have a shot at winning the title: Realistic chance: Spurs, Lakers, OKC, Heat Teams that are talented, but need some breaks along the way: Clippers, Memphis, Dallas, Boston, Chicago, Indiana Fans of the following teams, while they have no shot at a championship, at least have something interesting to watch: Denver (Iggy), Minnesota (How does Rubio bounce back?, AK47), Golden State (Can they stay healthy?), Houston (rookies), New Orleans (rookies), Philly (Bynum), NJ (decent on paper)
I do believe the elite players are much more important to winning in basketball than other sports. I think that's just the nature of the game, particularly in a sport where only 5 guys from a team are on the court at any one time.
Olajuwon-Barkley-Drexler Olajuwon-Barkley-Pippen Many people forget we had a super team ourselves. We had a super team before it was cool.
Nothing has changed. Since I have been watching basketball only around 5 teams each year have a legit shot at winning. Sometimes you get a surprise but it's quite rare. I don't see what the fuss is all about honestly. The methods may be different, as far as players now having a say in the matter, but the end result is still the same. Next year you will only have around 4-5 teams with a shot to win, just like the 80's, and the 90's, et.
wrong. In the 90s = 2 superstar player teams (ie Duncan/Robinson) Starks and Ewing In the 00s = 3 superstars lakers, boston, heat, NYK, etc In the 10s = 4 superstars heat and lakers... Every team will just be irrelevant. I would not be surprised If teams like the bobcats be moved or
Basketball is dominated by a few elite players. No way to get parity when a player like Jordan can lead his team to 6 championships. Only thing NBA can do is give teams an equal shot at getting those players in draft and having a chance to keep them.
The biggest thing I take away from this is that people should no longer deride players simply because they haven't won an NBA championship.
Ray Allen is not a superstar at this point.... Bosh is a borderline superstar at best. Pau Gasol is definitely not a superstar. 80s Celtics, Pistons, and Lakers were as stacked if not more. I don't even want to discuss how stacked of a team Russell had.
I agree this with this. I have been advocating for removing max salaries for a while. A hard salary cap would be nice, too. It would improve parity, but don't expect it to greatly increase the number of different championship teams. Whatever team Lebron is on will do well.
if by breaks you mean as in kobe breaks his leg, lebron breaks his arm etc than you are right with a few breaks those teams can be in contention.. in reality though this is a 3 horse race and no one else really has much of a chance okc, miami, LA just think LA almost took okc in the playoffs (with so many games being close) and now they add nash and howard. Who has okc added perry jones?
Just another reason n00bs need to realize that tanking or rebuilding is the only way to go for crap teams
Simple case of not enough talent in the NBA For 30 teams. Also when most of the talent is on one team. (heat, lakers, thunder) Only thing to make more parity would be to install a hard cap and take out max contracts.