Arn Tellem made a proposal this past week about how to fix the problem that the NBA has with player development. I won’t go into it in depth here, but it basically touched on the D-league, minimum age requirements, and rookie contracts. I thought that a lot of what he said made sense, but it kind of made me want to draw up my own proposal. Here it is.
1. Age requirements: I say that if NBA teams want to draft high schoolers, they should be able to. It also makes no sense to keep up the one and done rule, because some of these guys honestly don’t belong in or want to be in college. It doesn’t make sense for other students, professors or the school to invest time in guys who have no interest in staying more than one semester. However, if a player goes to college, they have to stay for three years at least. That makes it so that teams can really build their team for a few years.
2. D-league: This is my proposal to fix the D-league, anytime a team drafts a high school player, they are required to give them a four year contract and keep them in the D-league for at least two years. That means that if a guy like Emmanuel Mudiay decides to forgo college, then he will still be available for United States fan to see in the D-league, instead of relying on poorly edited YouTube clips. This will also incentivize every team to get their own affiliate if they don’t have one.
3. Rookie Contracts: I think that we keep a similar rookie scale to what we have now, with one added rule. Whenever you draft a player, sign them, and then put them in the D-league, you then have to double the length of their contract, at half of the annual salary. So, for example if the Thunder draft a player and sign them to a two year, five hundred thousand dollar per year contract, then send them down, their contract becomes four years at two hundred and fifty. That provides young players with a little more long-term financial protection.
There are doubtlessly holes in my plan, but I think I’m on the right track.
Second Screen 