So LeBron James and Kobe Bryant are on record for saying that if someone from overseas were to offer them $50 million a season, they'd bolt from the NBA.  First off, who wouldn't?  Anyone that claims they would turn down this kind of outrageous money for one season for any reason, patriotism or otherwise, is completely full of it.  It's more than double the max contract the NBA will allow under current salary cap restrictions, and it's tax free!.  Not only would they be lying, they'd be stupid. 

This has to get David Stern's knickers in a twist.  For decades now, Stern has led the way in marketing the NBA based upon its best and brightest superstar players.  If, all of a sudden, there is a significantly better financial option for these guys, do you think its just going to be one or two who split?  It's going to be a flood of the top players in the league, as long as the money is flowing from European clubs.  And the NBA slowly becomes a league sporting the best of what's left over.  I wonder if he's rethinking all of that International marketing, and the push to allow NBA'ers into the Olympics as the original Dream Team that seemed like such a good idea at the time?

Worst of all for the League is that there isn't really a damn thing they can do about it.  There's no way Stern can allow NBA teams to match this kinds of money without totally scrapping the salary cap system, and that kind of upswing in pay around the league would make owning an NBA team a massive money pit.  Not to mention that the kind of parity we saw this year would be a thing of the past.  With no salary cap, high revenue clubs would dominate every year.  This isn't baseball where one player, no matter how great he is, cannot make you a champion.  In the NBA, one player is routinely the difference between 20 wins and 50.

There are only a couple of ways for the League to even try to deal with this.  One is to let them go, stick to your principles and hope that the huge money being thrown around by foreign teams runs out.  I mean, when you're paying one guy $50 million, that has to make it kind of difficult to turn a profit.  Business sense would have to kick in eventually, right?  Well, not if they guy writing those checks is a billionaire who spends $50 million a week on champagne, caviar and high-end escorts. 

Another is to set up some sort of punitive rules against players who choose this route.  Not sure exactly what those would be, but a buy-in to regain NBA eligibility would be an interesting  possibility.   Wanna go play in Europe, LeBron?  Okay, but when you want back into the NBA, you have to pay the League 40% of the money you earned over there, up front.  Otherwise, it was nice knowing you.  This wouldn't work either, and is probably illegal, but Stern has played hardball with guys in the past, and I could definitely see him try to punish guys for having the audacity of leaving his league.

Another way, and this would be more in keeping with Stern's sneaky corporate manueverings, would be to lobby for the IRS to get involved.  As it stands right now, the players keep all of this money, tax free.  Make a few well-placed bribes (sorry, we call them campaign contributions now) and change the rules and make this money taxable for U.S. citizens at something like 75% and that levels the playing field, unless they want to not just play overseas but defect as well.  Collecting a tax free paycheck is one thing, leaving the United States forever is quite another.  And they could even cloak this in rah-rah patriotism, "Keeping the best of America in America."

But probably the most effective way, and one that doesn't involve sticking it to guys who have every right to tell David Stern and his flunkies to shove it and sell their unique talents to the highest bidder, is some kind of eventual merger between the NBA and the Euroleague.  Two conferences, one in this half of the world and one in that half, everyone working under the same salary structures.  That still wouldn't rule out rogue billionaires throwing around big money from lesser leagues, but it brings most of Europe's big money players (the financial kind, not the basketball kind) under the NBA umbrella and theoretically benefits all concerned, with the exception of the occasional transcendent superstar, and there's always marketing dollars out there for them, even more so with a truly world-wide league.

Any way around it, the face of the NBA is changing far more quickly than I or anyone would have anticipated.  Major changes are coming if the NBA is going to stay the best league in the world and not just a footnote to the European Championships.  The next couple of years will tell the tale.  Both Kobe and LeBron have contracts running out, and someone from overseas will make a run at them.   And it now looks like it's going to take a helluva lot more than just trading Richard Jefferson to clear salary cap space to make a run at either of them.

Converting to Euros

I was reading the NBA rumors this morning, trying to absorb all of the trade talk when I read one particular piece of news that could signal trouble brewing down the road.  Previously, I mentioned my dislike for the age limit, but I hadn't considered the financial repercussions thoroughly.  The news item was about Brazilian forward Tiago Splitter reneging on his agreement to join the San Antonio Spurs next season in favor of a four year extension with his current team, Tau Ceremica of the Euroleague, primarily because they can pay him several times what the NBA's rookie pay scale would allow.

Now consider, you're a LeBron James or a similarly gifted young American coming out of high school.  Your choices are play in the NCAA for peanuts, sit out a year and wait for the NBA (two years soon, if David Stern has his way and increases the age limit) or go play in the Euroleague right now for big bucks.  And after your initial contract with a Euroleague team is up, even if you're a star, you will still have to be restricted by the NBA rookie cap to come back home.  And that doesn't even consider that, in the Euroleague, you'll get paid in Euros, which are currently running pretty strong against the dollar.

What's to stop the best and brightest of American basketball youth from bolting overseas?  Patriotism?  And how difficult will it be to get them back in the NBA with the rookie wage scale?  How many stars will it take before Euroleague ball starts to compare favorably to the NBA in quality of play and competition?  It would be a bit ironic if David Stern's emphasis on international marketing of the game created a competitive market where the NBA would suffer, similar to what happened to the NFL in the early '80s with the USFL plucking stars, including several eventual Hall of Famers, right out of college.  The rookie wage scale could be a problem with NCAA stars, as well. 

As it is now, bolting overseas is seen as a last ditch effort by players who want to continue their careers but can't get on an NBA roster.  Most high schoolers and college players don't even consider the option.  But if it becomes more difficult to even get into the league, and can take up to five years from high school graduation to get paid what you're actually worth, that option may not stay with just fringe players.  A big-name talent, someone weighing these options, is going to open that door eventually and take the money.  And my guess is it will happen soon.  And when America's best start to spurn the NBA to go overseas, how long will it be before the international players that pepper NBA rosters today head back to their homes?  Now, the NBA is unquestionably the best league in the world, and everyone who's anyone wants to play with the best.  What happens when that designation is no longer so clear cut?

Stern would do well to carefully consider his decisions on these issues and cut it off before it becomes a possible nightmarish reality for the League, or we soon could be forced to watch late night feeds from Europe to see the best basketball in the world.

MVP: Most Valuable Player or Most Valuable Postseason?

It seems like nearly every year, the NBA's MVP voting would turn out remarkably different if it were held after the playoffs instead of after the regular season.  How many people still would have voted for Dirk Nowitzki last year after the Mavericks' historic collapse in the first round?  This year's MVP Kobe Bryant has a much stronger case after taking his team to the Finals, but, in my opinion, he wasn't a clear cut runaway with the award in the first place.  Not to say he didn't deserve it, I would have voted for him after the regular season, but why should the league's MVP award be given out before the most important and meaningful games of the season are even played?  Yes, there is the Finals MVP Award, but that discounts the performances of all of the players whose teams didn't reach the finals, a result often dictated by the relative strength of their supporting casts rather than any individual performance.

In my opinion, the MVP was a four-man race this year.  Here is how I would have voted after the regular season:

Player                             Points          Assists           Rebounds          Steals          Blocks
1.    Kobe Bryant            28.3               5.4                  6.3                        1.84            0.49      
2.    Chris Paul               21.1             11.6                 4.0                        2.71             0.05
3.    Kevin Garnett          18.8               3.4                  9.2                        1.41            1.25
4.    LeBron James       30.0                7.2                  7.9                        1.84            1.08   

Now,  after watching the playoffs, I've rearranged my thinking a bit.  I had LeBron 4th primarily because his team only won 47 games.  And Kobe beat out Chris Paul primarily because the Lakers beat out the Hornets for the top spot in the west.  And I wasn't yet a believer in the Celtics defense as the best in the league, despite 66 wins, so Garnett's efforts were downgraded a bit in my mind.

Now, it's pretty clear that both Chris Paul and LeBron James did more with less than Kobe Bryant (significantly less, in LeBron's case).  Garnett really did completely change Boston's approach, being instrumental in making them a truly excellent defensive team.  And Kobe led the way for a Laker team that handily beat the Nuggets, Jazz and Spurs on the way to the finals. 

But I suspect, had Manu Ginobli been healthy and his normal self, the Lakers might not have won that series with the Spurs.  Three of the four losses could have gone either way, despite some pretty miserable play from San Antonio, and the Spurs won the one game where Ginobli did look healthy pretty handily.  Against Boston, Kobe seemed to get worse as the series went on, as most of his teammates shrank as well, and did a disappearing act for long stretches of games 5 and 6.  Some of that was Boston's defense, but I think some of it was Kobe being too willing to launch long jumpers rather than find a way to adjust to the defense.

Chris Paul and the Hornets rolled through Dallas in the first round, and looked like they were going to do the same to San Antonio before the Spurs dug deep and fought to win the series in 7.  Their efforts against the Spurs sapped some of the juice from San Antonio's aging or ancient legs, making them further vulnerable to a much fresher Laker team that had cruised relatively untested through the first two rounds.  Paul's final assist of the playoffs was in wearing down the Spurs for the Lakers to take advantage.

I had only seen the Celtics a handful of times in the regular season, but after watching all 26 postseason games they played, it's was clearly apparent that Garnett, even though his stats weren't always fantastic, had truly reshaped what was a miserable team into a championship caliber club.  Admittedly, he clearly had the most talent around him by a pretty wide margin of any of the candidates, but talent doesn't win championships alone, the ability to merge that talent for a common goal does.  And Garnett led the way for the Celtic rejuvenation.

Unlike Kobe Bryant, LeBron James was able to adjust to the Celtics defense, going from completely baffled early in the series to completely dominant late in the series.  If it hadn't been for Paul Pierce putting up 41 in game 7 of their series with the Cavs, the Celtics wouldn't be hoisting any trophies.  And being that the Cavs beat Detroit last season, and nearly beat them the year before, it's not a stretch to suggest that LeBron could have returned to the Finals.  And with a team that plays the same kind of stifling defense that the Celtics used to beat the Lakers, who knows how that Finals matchup would have ended?  LeBron could be the one with the title surrounded by a team that would struggle to win 20 games all season without him in uniform.

So, here's how I would vote now, after watching the postseason, along with the player's post season stats:

Player                             Points          Assists          Rebounds          Steals          Blocks
1.   Kevin Garnett          20.4              3.3                 10.5                      1.35              1.12
2.   LeBron James       28.2               7.6                   7.8                      1.77              1.31
3.   Chris Paul               24.1              11.3                 4.9                       2.33              0.17
4.   Kobe Bryant            30.1               5.6                   5.7                       1.67              0.38

Any way I look at it, these four guys are all neck and neck.  I could arrange them in just about any order and it wouldn't be wrong.  So, just on gut instinct, after watching the post season, I would give it to Garnett.  It seems a little odd as he wasn't even the best player on his own team in the playoffs, but I just think his game changed the entire basis under which the Celtics play, the very essence of Most Valuable Player. 

By the way, I'm not a Kobe Hater.  I like Kobe Bryant as a player.  If anything, I think he defers his game too much.  I don't really think the Lakers roster is particularly well-suited to take full advantage of his skills.  They need big guys with heart to play physical inside, finish strong at the basket and rebound, unlike the Charmin-soft duo of Gasol and Odom.  But even liking a guy doesn't mean I'm not going to be critical if he deserves it.