KG, J O'Neal, LeBron have made themselves worthy of their early entry into the NBA.
So, why put an age limit? You can start your career in any sports. Even in China who starts recruiting future Olympians as soon as they're able to as in swimming.
The only pro i can think of is protecting the career of those aged NBA players who is still capable of playing, healthy, but with huge contracts but may not be able to play in the league bec their teams opted for rookies who are young & w/ lesser contracts..
Pretty funny that you have yet to come up with an argument of your own in this particular track. You could only latch onto a tongue-in-cheek one-liner by somebody who disagrees with you.
Maybe the NBA should ban all International players, a lot of them don't turn out very good either.
Lately, High Schoolers have been more hit than miss anyway. Since 2001 these High School players have been picked in the first round -
2001
Kwame Brown - Average player, 11/7 last season, injuries this season.
Tyson Chandler - Pretty sure leads the NBA in rebounding off the bench. Good player.
Eddy Curry - Very good low post scorer, needs to improve defense, but a legit NBA player.
Desagana Diop - Big but sucks
2002
Amare Stoudamire - Enough said.
2003
LeBron James - Enough said.
Travis Outlaw - New breed of long athetlic SF type. Still has time.
Ndui Ebi - See Outlaw, Travis.
Kendrick Perkins - Big guy who can have an impact, not show a lot yet.
(must be noted that other than LeBron the other 3 were taken in the 2nd half of the first round, no matter where you come from it generally takes a while to succeed coming from late in the first round)
2004
Dwight Howard - Good player already, going to be an absolute monster.
Shaun Livingston - Budding star, going to be great soon. Shown a lot late this season.
Robert Swift - I know very little about him, but he hasn't done much this season.
Sebastian Telfair - Drafted far to high, but has show a bit. Going to be good.
Al Jefferson - Very talented bigman, absolute steal for the Celts.
Josh Smith - Fantastic athlete, blocked 10 shots in one game. Good player.
JR Smith - Good scorer and athlete, decent shooter. Good player for a bottom feeder.
Dorrell Wright - I've heard he is fantastic but has had little chance for Miami.
Very few of those players could be called a failure. Most of them have shown a bit coming out of high school, and will only get better. Players coming out of college often don't show anything for a few years either, not just HS players. This was just the last 3 drafts, go back further and you will find Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett and Tracy McGrady coming straight out of High School.
Yeah, early entry from High School is really ruining the NBA
All the older players want this to happen and all the young kids don't want it to happen. It will give the older player more minutes and will guarentee them more years in the league, I think. And that's good.
Of course there are players that will succeed right away even comming from High School, LeBron, Stoudamire and so on. But there are so many more that won't. Look at guys like Kwame Brown. He has never reached his #1 pick status. Look at Jermaine O'Neal. He sat on the bench for 4 season doing almost nothing.
It will also improve the college game a lot. The college game has suffered in my opinion because guys like Josh Smith, Shaun Livingston, Dwight Howard, Al Jefferson, Sebastian Telfair never played there and guys like Kris Humphries only played one season, I think. Playing in college will help every basketball player. There they learn discipline and learn how play as a team. Often in High School these players are just given the ball and everybody else just watches.
I think it will also take back some of the bad publicity that the NBA has gotten. Young guys with alot of money to spent and some of them get into trouble.
So I'm all for the 20 age limit. It will help the NBA and it will help the college game.
I think an age limit is overall better for college ball, which is losing good players too early to build team chemistry, and better for the NBA, which is drafting a bunch of knuckleheads who are too immature to be team players.
But I think the players who will lose out are ones like Tony Parker, who are more mature than American players at age 18 by virtue of having played professionally early and a different European educational system.
But, I think future players like TP are worth making wait a couple more years in order to get more mature players in the NBA - not just for the sake of better basketball, but for the sake of the players' character.
You have to look at it from the colleges perspective.
Why should a college put forth the effort ans waste a scholarship spot on a player that is only using the college because he has to? It takes a lot of time and money to recruit and train a college player. And what about that it takes away a scholarship spot from a less talented player, a player that would truly benefit from the scholarship so he can be a true student athlete, and get his degree. These type players far outnumber the ones that go to the NBA, they are the bread and butter for the college game.
Leave the colleges out of this NBA problem.
If the NBA wants to get a farm league going, that would be better for all concerned.
I am for the limit. If there is already a limit at 18, then a it's not like there hasn't been a limit before.
If you want to argue college ball will kill players game, then those players who want to play in the NBA should play CBA, NBDL, or euro ball.
If your saying that a player could loose all their money by getting injured, then you have to take into consideration that it is only a two year period of time we talking about. A player could be injured in high school just as easily and not get paid either. If getting injured was such a concern, then 15 year-olds should be eligable for the the draft too. After all they might get injured during those 3 years before they turn 18.
I think an increase in the age limit to 20 would do more good than harm for the NBA.
Something like less than one in 35, or 2.9%, of high schoolers playing basketball will go on to play NCAA basketball. Then less than one in 75, or 1.3%, of NCAA basketball players will get drafted by an NBA team. It's somewhere around 3 or 4 per 10,000 high school players that wind up getting drafted.
Since 2000, 23 high school players have been selected in the NBA draft, including eight HS players drafted last year.
We're talking about a very, very select few kids with the athletic gifts to compete professionally. Sure, for every LeBron there's a trainwreck like Leon Smith waiting to happen. But that's the chance teams take. I'm almost surprised we haven't seen some sort of Joe Nuxhall act already. (Nuxhall was a 15 year old pitcher for the Reds during WW2)
I have a feeling that an age limit, if passed, will be enforced until the next phenom is getting ready to graduate from high school. Then either he'll sue for entry or the lottery winning team will pe ion for his entry.
NBA problem, not a college problem.
I don't agree with the argument that they are throwing away an education ..like their decision to go to the NBA, going to college will also be their decision. The only thing they will be throwing away is their eligibility for NCAA sports. If they go pro and get a contract, they can turn right around and set aside money for an education or even purchase their education at that time for the future.
I think oneal is definitely showing his high school education...that is if he actually attained it and was not ushered through due to his basketball.
This would be the one reason why an age limit should be required. The players are so sheltered and pampered, they have a very egocentric worldview.
Imagine the NBA requiring a degree(anything sport/health related). Most every job where you can make 6 figures or more require at least a B.A. and most likely a Master's or PhD.
For the most part I think a 20 year old limit for the "real" NBA coupled with a true farm league type NBDL is a good idea...
I also like the idea of expanding the draft a couple more rounds to allow pro teams to gamble on talent without sacrificing cap space on the "A" team and then put the players in an environment where they can concentrate on real player development...both skill wise and personally...Hopefully they will incorporate "life skills" training into the NBDL as well as just basketball...make it mandatory to go through a "personal development" program...teach them about budgets, talk about the pitfalls of players real lives (predatory "friends" etc.) seriously discuss "life after basketball" etc...
As someone pointed out earlier...the real problem with the 18 year olds coming out is not the super talented ones like LeBron James...it's the borderline talents that try to come out before they are really ready...High school is the only standard they have to judge themselves by and for the most part players that are big/athletic/early maturing can look like superstars judged by that standard even if they aren't true NBA talent yet...but still think they are...they may have raw athletic ability but not the maturity/skills/work ethic...so they hook up with an agent and get passed in a two round draft...squandering any opportunity they might have of playing in college and at least getting an education if pro basketball doesn't work out...the bling bling is just too irresistible...
Even your super gifted could benefit from a program like this...They can play in an environment for a couple of years where the focus of the program is nurturing and expanding skills and not winning games...a true DEVELOPMENT league...in the long run this could only benefit the game...
There are at least four interested parties and perspectives on this:
1. Under 20 players – for the most part it’s in their best interest to allow drafting at 18.
Pros: Earlier payday, longer potential paying career, some that end up sucking will have still gotten a few million out of the system..
Cons: A few, not many will have benefited form additional maturation, might have made it had they been better prepared physically and/or mentally but wash out instead with the early entrance. Maturity is overrated though. Most knuckleheads are born that way or get a big assist from their parents. After all Rodman, Jayson Williams and Artest all went to college.
2. Established NBA players – heavily in their interest to have an age limit
Pros: They’d probably like to have a 25 y.o. age limit. Once your in the show you want to stay in the show and keep drawing those million dollar paychecks. Young blood is just compe ion to put them into that post-NBA used cars sales job.
Cons: None. Owners should use age as a bargaining chip that they may lower the limit to 16 to wring more concessions from the players’ union.
3. NBA management/owners – heavily in their interest to have an age limit
Pros: They stop wasting money on crap shoot players that don’t pan out or get millions while they sit on the bench or IR learning their craft and when they finally are players are up for new contracts. Players come into the game with a better skill set. Players come out of college with greater buzz publcitiy (wise witness the vastly overrated and overhyped Carmelo Anthony)
Cons: Lose the once every ten year LeBron James for a couple of years of his career, offset by the even more incredible hype they have coming out of college (again witness the vastly overrated and overhyped Carmelo Anthony).
3. The NBA fan - – heavily in their interest to have an age limit
Pros: Depth and quality of teams will improve with players spending an extra couple of years learning their craft before they reach the NBA. We might actually see a player with a mid-range shot again in our lifetime.
Cons: Lose the once every ten year LeBron James for a couple of years of his career (Ducks would disagree), offset by the even more incredible hype they have coming out of college (again witness the vastly overrated and overhyped Carmelo Anthony).
great post
this site occasionally has threads that really make me realize just how awesome the quality of posters here really is...
props to Kori and LJ again for making it possible...
Ive always liked this idea kind of like baseball having farm teams. Gives
them a chance to develop and get prepared for the transition.
The real problem that no one wants to talk about is the NCAA.
They basically want back their two years of SLAVE labor from the best basketball players.
Sure, they say they are getting an education (woo a full scholorship to the tune of 25k a year TOPS to big basketball schools) so that justifies their making millions of dollars a year off these kids.
It's akin to sharecropping. It's wrong, and I am one of the most conservative posters on the boards. If they want these kids to represent their schools they need to CHANGE THE AMATUER policy. It's a farce. No one believes it AT ALL. No one buys into it.
What really needs to happen is the government needs to break up the NCAA. No more state sanctioned monopoly.
Bingo. The owner's position has nothing to do with improving the quality of the game.
Many are mistakenly focusing on the age 20. Try zeroing in on years 22 and 24 - the age players are (or would be) when they become eligible to sign their first big contract. Collectively, the owners would love to have two more years to evaluate the talents (or lack thereof) of Eddy Curry, Tyson Chandler and Kwame Brown. Instead, they will likely get stuck with bad contracts.
I expect if there is a very well run NBDL with professional coaches and trainers that establishes a successful track record of preparing players for the NBA it will give the NCAA a run for their money for some of the better players. Net effect potentillay could be that it drains more of the better players away from the college ranks than the current system.
As a corrolary a minor league system will increase the number of professional paying jibs for coaches, trainers, players, refs. Provide a feeder system for all of these. Minor league teams may also increase league popularity as more loocal fans get involved in professional basketball and follow their favorite players into the NBA.
Imagine after 3 years in the NBA, coming out of high school ... he blows out his knee. Sure, he had 3 years at the rookie salary, but that's not much. He doesn't have an education, and you can only survive off endorsements for so long. Where's his fallback?
This is Bull .
A college education is worth more to these young players than 25K a year.
99% of college players will never make any money playing pro ball, and if they did not get a scholarship, 99% of college players would nevr be able to go to college and they would end up making about 30k-45/yr tops as a worker w/o a degree.
If you get a degree, you can make 80-300K/yr so that college degree is worth a lot more than 25K.
18 is old enough for a man to decide what he wants to do with his life.
if he doesn't have the talent or potential, he won't be drafted.
this is America baby...land of opportunity.
part of the "life skills" part of the NBDL could be explaining how disability insurance works...even without insurance he would/should be 21 years old with several hundred thousand dolars in the bank...I would say thats a pretty decent start on life...I've got blown knees (4 surgerys) and still manage to get by...
After 3 years in the NBA, Lebron will have ac ulated more than $10,000,000 in paychecks.
this rule is just as much about protecting older players as it is younger ones. teams are more willing to sign an 18 year old with "tremendous upside" than a veteran over 30 whose skills are known. it isn't as much about making kids go to college as it is trying to regulate the quality of play in the nba - for every lebron james there are 3 or 4 kwame browns. and, just because you have a college degree there is no guarantee you can get a job, much less one that pays well. go to any restaurant in austin and ask the waitstaff how many of them have degrees - it will surprise you...
You know, the arguement that that deals with college education fails to address an important issue:
Whats to stop you from getting an education at a University if you have suffered a career ending injury? You know, the vast majority of students are not on scholarship.
The simple fact is that if I know I'm going to be drafted into the NBA, I'm not going to college to risk an injury for any reason. While in the NBA, I can work on my college degree or I can set money aside to attend school after the NBA. When you look at the monetary value of a what the NCAA offers students compared to what the NBA offers, you have to take into account that entering the NBA does not mean you can not enroll at a University. But playing basketball for the NCAA does mean that you have placed your NBA career at risk in order to pursue something you cuold have gotten while in the NBA.
This is about one thing, and one thing only. It's no different from most of the others issues in the CBA, such as the cap, which are simply in place to stop the owners from hurting themselves.
I'm generaly against them. You can't argue that the NBA game is watered down, because if you don't have scrubs from HS on some of those teams, you are simply going to have older scrubs on the rosters. You would also not have players such as Carmelo, Lebron, Amare, Parker, and others who have been making impacts at under the age of 20. It's not as though if the Clippers draft an 18 year old project that a great talent went unnoticed.
If you want to have a minor leauge, thats fine. But what is the point of having an age limit in the NBA? Do you really want to send the future Lebrons to their own meaningless minor leauge for a couple of years?
Last edited by MannyIsGod; 04-12-2005 at 10:14 AM. Reason: the word no in place of any was bugging me.
As much as I would like to think there is not some subconscious racism involved in the debate over NBA age limits, there's really no way around it. When you consider that no one seems to have the same problem with Baseball and Hockey, or even non-black foreign basketball players (Darko Milicic rarely seems to come up in these discussions, for some reason), the common denominator is that we're uncomfortable with black kids making basketball a priority over school.
And while there is probably a lengthy discussion to be had about educational priorities in African American culture, an enforced Age Limit amounts to reverse Affirmative Action against kids who don't need to go to college at the age of 18 to earn a living.
Plus, as Manny pointed out, there's no time table for going to college. The implied "straight to college after high school" rule is overrated... and I believe it causes a lot of burnout with kids who, frankly, aren't ready for a higher education. That, also, is a topic ripe for discussion.
But back to the NBA... if the league gets to a point where High School players are adversely affecting the level of play in the league, owners will see the effects on their bottom line, and they will draft accordingly. But I don't think we've seen any higher a percentage of High School NBA failures than 4-years-of-college failures.
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