The NCAA might want take another look at the one-and-done rule

Brandon Jennings was supposed to be the poster boy for terrible advice and decision making.

In the summer of 2008, Jennings was the first kid to try playing professionally in Europe for a season to avoid playing a year in college. Many questioned his decision to play a year abroad, and that number grew as Jennings struggled to get consistent playing time and posted mediocre numbers in his one season in Rome.

But that didn't stop the Bucks from taking Jennings with the 10th pick in the 2009 draft.

And it looks like they made the right decision.

Brandon Jennings has played great in his first two NBA games.
(photo credit: ESPN)

We are just two games into his NBA career, and Jennings looks like the star that every thought he would be. In his debut, Jennings went for 17 points, 9 boards, and 9 assists. In his second outing on Halloween, Jennings went for 24 points, including 16 during a third quarter that saw the Bucks turn an 11 point deficit into an 11 point advantage.

I know that this is just two games, but that doesn't change the fact that Jennings has had an incredible start to his career. While I am happy for him, this could be a really bad thing for college basketball. The NCAA's whole argument is that college is the best place for a basketball player to develop, which is why these kids need to spend at least one, and possibly two, seasons on campus.

But Jennings is currently in the process of proving that theory wrong.

I mean, think about the decision a kid like Jennings has to make. You can either play in college, where you have to go to class and get reimbursed with a free education; or you can go play somewhere in Europe, make a bunch of money, get experience as a professional, and still come back and be drafted.

Which sounds more appealing to you?

If Jennings does end up becoming a successful player early on in his career, that could open the floodgates for 18 and 19 year olds to head overseas to play in order to avoid their one year in college. While this isn't a problem for the NBA front office guys - they still get a chance to scout these prospects for a year outside of high school - it could be a major issue for the NCAA.

How are they going to be able to convince the best of the best to make it to campus?

Somewhere, Sonny Vaccaro is smiling.
Continue reading...

BRANDON JENNINGS NEEDS TO LEARN TO KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT: A few weeks after he decided to let the world know that Ricky Rubio is overrated, Brandon Jennings is running is mouth again.

This time, it is a phone conversation with rapper Joe Budden. Video very NSFW.



Jennings apparently didn't know he was being videotaped, and spouts off about the Knicks, Ricky Rubio, Chris Duhon, Jordan Hill, and Scott Skiles (am I missing anyone?).

The best line of the video comes at the 5:10 mark. After Jennings goes on a rant about how the Knicks left him hanging by not picking him and tells Joe Budden that "Duhon ain't gonna get it done", the rapper responds with "Yo, you talk too much, go score a point."

I feel like Jennings is going to end up regretting this video.

Continue reading...

Essence in Rome: The Brandon Jennings Mixtape

Obviously, this is a mixtape, so it is going to highlight his, well, highlights, and ignore his flaws. But watching this you can really see that Brandon Jennings has some serious talent. Some of his crossovers are absolutely vicious (at 1:55 some poor Euro-sucker gets abused), and he can clearly lead a break.

Again, take this for what it is worth, as it is a mixtape.

But who doesn't love a good mixtape.



Continue reading...

Jeremy Tyler to go pro

Jeremy Tyler has decided to skip his final year of eligibility and head to the professional level.

Pretty standard post, right?

It is, until you consider that Tyler is a 17 year old finishing up his junior year in high school.

Tyler, a 6'11" center from San Diego High School currently committed to Louisville, will be leaving school to play pro ball in Europe for two seasons before he is eligible for the draft. According to the article, Tyler looks like he is headed for Spain, but he has yet to sign anything.

Maybe the decision by Brandon Jennings to skip college for Europe will have a bigger effect than first thought.

A quote from Tyler to the New York Times:

Nowadays, people look to college for more off-the-court stuff versus being in the gym and getting better. If you're really focused on getting better, you go play pro somewhere. Pro guys will get you way better than playing against college guys.

I'm not exactly sure how I feel about this decision. I've never been a fan of the one-and-done rule, simply because it is strictly in place to benefit the NCAA and the NBA.

But leaving high school early to go pro?

There is no question that Tyler is good (he is #9 in Rivals top 150 for 2010), with a chance to be great. One scout told Dan Wetzel that Tyler could play in the NBA right now, and many people have him projected as the #1 pick in the class of 2011. But sending a kid - and a 17 year old junior is very much a kid - to another country to play professional basketball against grown men is going to be quite trying.

Just ask Brandon Jennings, who averaged just 5.8 ppg and 2.3 apg in Italian League games and 7.6 ppg and 1.2 apg in 16 Euroleague games.

But this decision is different for Tyler, mainly due to his size. Playing at the high school level, Tyler may face five guys all season with his size, and maybe one with his combination of size and ability.

Explain to me how a center with NBA aspirations is going to get better going up against 6'4" and 6'5" kids triple-teaming and hacking the hell out of him.

He isn't.

So he was basically left with two decisions: go to a basketball factory (like an Oak Hill Academy) and then spend a year a Louisville, where he is pretending to be a student athlete and watching white guys is suits line their pockets off of his ability; or go play pro ball in Europe, where he can make a good chuck of change, spend everyday going toe-to-toe with grown men his size, and spend every waking hour working on his game.

While I do believe this makes sense, both financially and from a basketball standpoint for Tyler, I wish there was some way to keep kids like Tyler and Jennings from heading overseas.

Because in reality, the only people truly getting hurt are college basketball fans.
Continue reading...

Bob Knight as a Color guy?

It looks like those rumors of Bobby Knight returning to the sidelines won't be coming to fruition, at least for this season. After experimenting with Knight as an in-studio analyst at the end of last season, the Worldwide Leader has decided to put Knight in the booth this year. He will be paired up with Brent Musberger for Thursday night games and Dan Shulman for various non-conference games during the week.

I'm not sure how this will work out for ESPN. On the one hand, there may not be anyone in the world that knows his x's and o's better than Knight. But at times last year, Knight seemed bored on-air and gave off this vibe that talking about basketball on TV was below him. It didn't seem like he enjoyed what he was doing, although I'm sure a large part of that is just Bob Knight being surly old Bob Knight (I'm sure Dickie V's ass-kissing only helped the situation). And how long do you think it would be until he dropped an F-bomb live on the air?

But as I said before, there may not be anyone that knows the game better than Knight, even if he is a bit inexperienced on air. ESPN is pairing him with two of the best and most experienced play-by-play guys out there in Shulman and Musberger. Do you think the WWL has the stones to assign Knight to an Indiana game?

So other interesting news and notes:

Chris Broussard caught up with Brandon Jennings in Rome. It looks like the young fella is doing pretty good for himself. I've been saying it from the beginning - this was a great decision by Jennings.

The LA Times and New York Times both had interesting pieces on how the new three-point line is effecting college hoopers. Will we end up being right? Continue reading...

Jason Whitlock on Brandon Jennings Round 2

Jason Whitlock of Fox Sports weighs in on the Brandon Jennings decision again, this time after sitting down for an interview with both Jennings and former sneaker rep Sonny Vaccaro (see below for video of the interviews).

I have believed that Jennings made the correct decision from the beginning, and in general, I completely agree with Whitlock. He changed his stance a little bit in this article - he toned down the black-kids-exploited-by-white-officials argument - but he still is making the same point. Why is it fair to force kids to go to school for one year, when (and I know I have beaten this point to death on this blog) the sole purpose of the one year is so that the NCAA and NBA can profit? Vaccaro hits it right on the head with this quote:

(Miles) Brand said they've made millions of dollars before with kids playing in college, and they'll make millions after. They're not going to rescind the CBS contract. They're not going to rescind the new contract with the leagues. He doesn't give a damn about the kids. He doesn't care about caring for the kids. It's a business proposition.

He's right. It's not fair to force the kids to go to school if the reason is so the suits and the leagues can profit. I do, however, think it is fair to force kids to go to school because they are not ready for the league yet. I don't think one year in college is enough, but if the players had to go to college for two years and had to be 20 years old to enter the draft, I would have no problem.

I understand Whitlock's argument about baseball players, but I don't necessarily agree with it. He says:

Why demonize a kid for pursuing his dream? We don't do it to baseball players who join the minor leagues for relative peanuts straight out of high school. Why basketball players?

But baseball has an elaborate minor league system. You never see players come out of high school and go straight to the bigs. For the most part, the top prospects spend years in the minors trying to learn to hit a curveball or to make their change-up look like a fastball. Many top draft picks never reach the majors.

Basketball doesn't have that; they have the D-League. When there was no one year rule, 18 year old draft picks were expected to come into the NBA and perform against the best players in the world. Some were successful (LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, KG, arguably the three best players in the league) while many were not (remember these names - Ousmane Cisse, Ndudi Ebi, Lenny Cooke).

I find it interesting that Whitlock conveniently forgets to mention that the NFL has a much stricter rule than the NBA - three years out of high school. This is one is tough to argue simply because of the physical maturity and sheer strength necessary to handle the daily beatings. In the NBA, you need mental maturity and, for lack of a better word, "game" maturity. In high school, most of these guys succeed simply because they are just better athletes - they're taller, quicker, jump higher - but their skill level is not even close to the level it needs to be to succeed in the NBA. Whitlock barely even mentions this point, if he does at all. He's right - the NCAA is a rigged system, but sending kids into the NBA unprepared is not good for them, its not good for the NCAA, and its not good for the NBA.

I've mentioned it before, but what is the problem with forcing these kids to go to school, and then giving them a little money for it. If you paid them $150 a week like I suggested here, then they would be making as much as their minor league baseball counterparts. Because that what the NCAA essentially is - NBA minor leagues?

He made one other point that was interesting, and which I never even thought about. In college, there are limits as to how much time per week a coach is allowed to work with a player. In Europe, there are none. So even if Jennings gets stuck at the end of the bench on a team, he will still have much more time on the practice court - either going against professional point guards, or working out on his own. And, as Whitlock puts it:

Strictly from a basketball standpoint, a year in Europe will do Jennings good. No one who knows anything about basketball believes Lute Olson would teach Jennings a thing about the fundamentals of the game. I'm not taking a cheap shot at Lute to defend Jennings' decision. It's a well-known fact within basketball circles that Lute Olson is famous for rolling the ball on the court, kicking back and enjoying the work of his recruiters. Lute Olson is not Bobby Knight.

And as far as culture shock goes, Jennings went from Dominguez High School in Compton to Oak Hill Academy in country Virginia. Pretty differing cultures, no?

Here are the videos of the Vaccaro and Jennings interviews.


Whitlock with Jennings


Whitlock visits Vaccaro Continue reading...

Brandon Jennings to Italy

Brandon Jennings has signed with a team in Italy. He has signed a three-year, multi-million dollar contract with Rome-based Pallacanestro Virtus Roma, but the deal has buy-out clauses that would allow Jennings to make himself eligible for the NBA Draft in 2009.

UPDATE: From ESPN:

Virtus Roma is considered a midlevel Italian team and is not regarded among the elite clubs favored to reach the Euro Final Four. But the competition at that level is still high. Last season's roster included former American college players Allan Ray (Villanova), David Hawkins (Temple), Christian Drejer (Florida), Erazem Lorbek (Michigan State) and Ibrahim Jaaber (Penn). The point guard spot could be open for Jennings if Roko Ukic signs with the Toronto Raptors, which is a possibility. The only other point guard listed on last season's roster is Italian Jacopo Giachetti.

An NBA executive told ESPN.com that Virtus Roma is considered a "good team, with an old-school coach," but the executive said he thought that "Rome would be an adventure for [Jennings]."

Jennings said he asked Virtus Roma general manager Dejan Bodiroga whether or not the team needed a point guard when he worked out for Bodiroga last week in Las Vegas.

"He said they need one,'' Jennings said. "I guess they want to make me the icon there. They're real excited about me coming to work for them. They know the deal. They know what they're getting in and feel comfortable about the whole situation.''

Best of luck Brandon, I hope it works out well. Continue reading...

7/16 - Some Links, Some News

-So now that it is official that Brandon Jennings is going to Europe, the question is where will he end up? Luis Fernandez over at Draft Express tells you everything you need to know about where he is looking and where he should be looking. Picking the correct league to suit his needs and abilities is so important for Jennings. As Fernandez puts it:

Europe is a huge mass of different basketball competitions, with some of them hardly resembling each other. This is not like playing in the NBA, where there are 30 defined teams and a comparable level between them. Overseas, there are some incredibly competitive leagues and some easier ones, balanced and unbalanced, defensive oriented and scoring happy, with an intense tactical approach and more free styled, better leagues and worse leagues, with a huge gap between them.

It would likely be a big mistake for Jennings to put himself into an excessively demanding environment. A high profile team (like Euroleague outfit Rome- who are rumored to be strongly in the picture) usually enjoy a deep roster and a very structured game on both ends of the court. There are no one-man shows here, the ball needs to flow and the team works united for a purpose. A player like Jennings, who loves to jack up shots and to dribble looking for the final definitive pass, probably doesn’t enjoy the experience and maturity to adjust quickly enough. Playing in a top league, you need to be extremely mature and consistently effective in order to enjoy significant freedom within the system, certainly not the easiest task for such a young kid playing the point guard position.

This is definitely worth the read, as Fernandez takes an in depth and interesting look at European basketball and how Jennings would fit in each league.

-Originally called an injured hamstring tendon, it now appears Gonzaga forward Austin Daye partially tore his ACL at the LeBron James Skills Academy summer camp. This is a huge blow to the 'Zags Final Four hopes, especially since they play in the mid-major West Coast Conference. It took 5 1/2 months for Brandon Rush to come back off of this same injury last off-season, and he returned from the injury early. If Daye has surgery, it means he will be out until at least January, missing all of Gonzaga's non-conference schedule - the most important time for tournament seeding for a mid-major.

-In 2003, the last time that Kansas made the NCAA final, the Jayhawks faced the very same situation they did in the 2008 final - down three with the ball, only seconds left on the clock. In 2003, Kirk Hinrich found Michael Lee in the corner for what seemed like a wide open three, until Hakim Warrick took off from what seemed like the block to swat the shot out of bounds (Note: if anyone knows where I can find a video of this play, let me know. As much as I hate the 'Cuse, this was one of the most memorable and out-of-this-world athletic plays I've ever seen live). Dana O'Neill of ESPN, who I love as a writer, caught up with Lee who, in a cruel? ironic? interesting twist of fate, was at the Alamo Dome when Chalmers hit the game-tying three.

-Speaking of Kansas, the outlook for their season just got a whole lot more promising. Remember back in June when reports surfaced that Sherron Collins had skipped a court date and was looking at serious legal trouble and a $75,000 fine? Well, the district attorney has decided not to file charges against the Jayhawk.

-While were on the topic of sexual assaults (my segues are impeccable today), former Florida Gators shooting guard Teddy Dupay was in court Monday facing rape and kidnapping charges stemming from a June 19th incident in Park City, Utah. This isn't the first time Dupay has been in trouble with the law. He was kicked off the Florida team after it was discovered that he gambled on college sports. The accusations are pretty disturbing, so I'm going to leave them off of this post, but take a look at his mug shot. He's fallen a long way from the 2000 National Title game.

-Now, one last piece of recruiting news. Pitt has landed top 25 recruit Dante Taylor, a 6'9", athletic combo forward. Already a top 5 team, the addition of more front court athleticism only solidifies the Panthers as a Big East and Final Four favorite.

-More Big East news. It looked like Derrick Caracter had burned all of his bridges at Louisville, but apparently Rick Pitino has told him that if he can keep his nose clean for a year, then Caracter can return to the Cardinal team for the 2009-2010 season. For all the hype and talent that Caracter has, is it really worth having the constant distraction around your team? I guess Pitino is just hedging his bets in case Samardo Samuels and Earl Clark both leave for the draft this year. Continue reading...

Bettering College Basketball

A buddy of mine, Andy of Bi-Monthly Blog fame, recently asked why I had not yet commented on the moving of the college three-point line from 19'9" to 20'9". I am going to wait until closer to the start of the season to discuss the move (partly because I am torn over its effects, partly because I wasn't thinking about anything other than the draft until recently), but it got me thinking about changes that could (and should) be made to better college basketball. I wrote about one of those changes here and here, regarding Brandon Jennings and the one-year rule, but there are a couple of other changes I would make as well.

Before I get to that, I just want to say one more thing about the one-year rule. The reason I am so against it is not because I think high schoolers should be playing in the NBA - in fact, I believe the exact opposite. My problem with the rule is that the reason that it has been put into effect is because it allows the NBA to draft players that have already built up name recognition - if Derrick Rose was coming off of a state title instead of a trip to the NCAA finals, does he still go #1? Is there the same discussion revolving Oden-vs.-Durant or Rose-vs.-Beasley as the first pick? The NCAA benefits from the rule as well because they get the best players in the country suiting up for a year. The only people who don't benefit are the players themselves. They spend a year making a mockery of the term student-athlete while everyone makes money off of their talents except themselves.

If the NBA was serious about the claims that they want more of a chance to scout players they are drafting, and that they want the players to be more prepared for the NBA, make them go to school for two years (which, depending on how the Brandon Jennings situation pans out, could very well end up happening). Two years in college will give the players more of a chance to grow into their bodies (how many 19 year olds are physically ready to handle the NBA), learn the game, and develop their skills while keeping the moniker student-athlete somewhat accurate.

But that doesn't account for the issue that the players generate a ton money and do not get much compensation (what is a scholarship really worth to Michael Beasley when he only has to go to class for one semester) when, if they were playing professionally, they would be able to. Bottom line, I think that the players should be getting paid. Nothing huge - maybe like $600 a month depending on the school (bigger schools equal more revenue equal more compensation). Think about it - for any teenager that doesn't have to worry about things like rent or the cable bill, $150 a week will seem like a lot of money. Being able to get a couple of new shirts or a new pair of Jordans every week could keep a lot of players happy (especially when a lot of them get at least that already). I'll take it one step further - have the money come from the boosters that provide players with the (currently) illegal benefits. If you make the players file a tax return, then you can kill two birds with one stone - if there are legal consequences to the player receiving OJ-Mayo-esque benefits, then it will greatly reduce the likelihood of players taking that chance (right now, only USC is facing any backlash - losing scholarships, forfeiting games, fines - while Mayo gets away with just a little damage to his reputation).

Another change, as I mentioned Wednesday, is that I would make basketball (and football, baseball, or any other sport where the possibility of a career in that sport exists) a major, especially for schools with big time sports programs. Just to clarify, I'm not saying that these schools (or the NCAA) should allow these athletes to participate in the sport and represent the school without going to any class at all. Instead, educate them in something that will help these kids down the road. As Rick Reilly so tactfully noted in his column last week, there is a huge problem with athletes ending up broke way to quickly after they retire. This happens for many reasons - horrific spending decisions, poor money management, bad investments, and the fact that after taxes, agent/publicist/etc. fees, and the obligatory mansion (or two) and Bentley (or three), there really isn't that much left.

Brian Cuban (Mark Cuban's brother) had an enlightening interview with agent Jordan Woy about this issue, where Woy says

if athletes educate themselves, learn money management skills and make smart, safe investments along the way, they are usually in very good shape. After representing athletes for over 20 years, we call this our “life plan”. We take out clients to learn business networking. We have people from industries such as real estate, oil and gas, financial planning, credit repair, asset protection/estate planning, etc. come to educate the players and their wives so they can learn about these business and also determine if they are interested in any of these industries for life after sports.

Why not put the players under this "basketball" major in classes like this? For one thing, you might actually get some of them to attend and pay attention in class. Maybe you could even turn some of these one-and-done guys into honest-to-goodness student-athletes. I mean, I guarantee that Michael Beasley would have gotten more out of a class on how to value real estate or how to invest money effectively than he did from english 101 or geometry. You could even have classes on becoming a basketball coach, an announcer, or even a writer.

Needless to say, it is not as simple as creating a basketball major. For one, there are only a few schools, and only a few players at those schools, where doing something like this would even be feasible or logical (maybe just a generic professional athlete major where you can get a concentration in a particular sport would be more effective). There is also so much potential for corruption and grade fixing, a la Jim Harrick, but doesn't that already happen way too often? If a school is going to cheat, the school is going to cheat regardless of what classes the player is in.

Another risk is that some of the players under this major don't have the talent to be a pro and thus the classes that they would take would not be as beneficial to them - learning how to manage your money won't help if you can't make any. But isn't this a risk that is inherent in any major for every college student? How many college students know what they want to do in life when they choose their major? I have an econ degree, which probably won't help me too much as a sportswriter.

The bottom line is that the real student-athletes are still going to go to class and get a degree in a field they want to pursue. But by adding this option, you can help some kids learn how to capitalize on their talent and the money that they make off of it.

The last change that I would make is to eliminate the play-in game in the NCAA tournament. If one less middling high-major makes the tourney, is it really that big of a deal? Since 1985, when the tournament was expanded to 64, only 19 times has an 8 seed or lower reached the Elite 8, and only five times has one made the Final Four - 11 seed George Mason in 2006, 8 seeds North Carolina and Wisconsin in 2000, 11 seed LSU in 1986, and 8 seed (and eventual champion) Villanova in 1985.

You want more stats? Of the previously mentioned 19, only four were at-large bids that were lower than 11, meaning that they were one of the last schools to get into the tournament as an at-large - George Mason and LSU from above, 12 seed Missouri in 2002 and 11 seed Loyola Marymount in 1990 (in 2002, 11 seed Temple won the A-10 tourney). So only four times in the last 23 years has a team that could be effected by the reduction of an at-large made it as far as the Elite 8. The last few teams to get in are always either a mediocre power conference team or a very good mid-major that lost during their conference tourney. To be honest, I wouldn't mind losing one of them each year.

The biggest reason that I believe the NCAA tournament should go back to 64 teams (or at the very least remain at 65) is one simple reason: NCAA tournament pools. The way it is currently set up, the whole bracket can fit onto one, standard 8 1/2" X 11" piece of paper. All anyone in the world has to do is print out the bracket, fill in some team names, and throw down 10 bucks in your office pool and boom, you're thrown head first into the excitement of March Madness. That's the beauty of it. No matter who you are or what you do, no matter how much you care or know about college basketball, you are only one bracket away from having everything on the line.

Part of the reason it works so well is that it is so easy to print out that one piece of paper. If the tournament expands to 72, 96, 128, or whatever number Jim Boeheim asks for next, will your boss have the time to fill out that many games? Will your girlfriend have the energy to pick out her favorite mascots on multiple pages? Will the tourney still be the national spectacle it is if every average Joe and Jane doesn't fill out a bracket?

So there you have it - my proposed changes for the 2008-2009 basketball season. Leave a comment and tell me what you think. Continue reading...

7/10 - Some Links, Some News

The Brandon Jennings Edition!! These are links to some of the best (and some of my favorite) writers' opinions on Jennings trip across the pond. And for the record, I'm sick of talking about Brandon Jennings, so hopefully this will be the last post about him for a while.

First, there's a couple of things that are bothering me about all of this. For one, it's ridiculous to me that anyone can question whether or not a European team will take on Brandon Jennings for one year. NBA teams routinely pay $500,000, if not more, to buy out players under still under contract in Europe. Jennings expects to make around $300,000 (actually, it may be closer to $100,000 according to Euro basketball guru Jonathan Givony), but even if he does sign for 300k, the European team could still conceivably end up more than $200,000 ahead. Buy for a dollar, sell for two.

It also bothers me when people say one of the risks he faces is that he will fall off the map for NBA scouts. Please!! The NBA scouts Europe almost as much as they scout the NCAA at this point. Add to that the fact that everyone even remotely associated with basketball now knows the name Brandon Jennings (and will probably be following his Euro trip very closely) and there is no way that he will lose any profile. Maybe his draft stock drops a bit, but name recognition won't.

And with that, on to the links.

-Jason Whitlock of Fox Sports: "We all (know) assume that big-time basketball and football recruits receive "illegal" benefits for pretending to be student-athletes at America's institutions of higher learning. We also (know) assume that journalists and news organizations can make names for themselves by exposing the fact that the kids and their parents/guardians are just as greedy as the constantly renegotiating coaches we put on pedestals. Brandon Jennings, a former Arizona commit, is smart. Why play the silly game? Why pretend to be a college student for one semester when he can't even "pass" the SAT or ACT? Why let a jealous member of his posse do what Louis Johnson did to O.J. Mayo?"

-Dana O'Neill of ESPN: "The coaches point to the obvious concerns -- potential injury and lousy play, either of which would cripple a player's NBA draft value. Europe, after all, isn't exactly the ugly stepchild to America's game it once was. Boeheim pointed to Danilo Gallinari, the sixth pick in this year's NBA draft, who was considered an elite player in Italy yet averaged only 14.9 points and 4.2 rebounds there. And if a player fails, by injury or lack of production, there is no safety net. An NBA dream can quickly turn into a European journeyman's course."

-The Big Lead: "How many 18-year-olds can handle going from high school to living on your own in Europe? Did any of them see how much soccer star Landon Donovan hated it? It’s one thing to play in college for a few years, then ride an NBA bench for a few years before going to Euro to make a career out of it in your late 20s. But a teenager? We’re more curious about how the European teams handle this. Will they really be willing to give a player $300,000 for one year of service, knowing that said player is simply coming there to show NBA scouts what they’re made of? Have European teams expressed interest in American high school players?"

-Jeff Goodmann of Fox Sports: "Jennings move to Europe will be an interesting test case for future kids who could explore the overseas market instead of going to prep school. I don’t expect an influx of players to go this route, because frankly, there’s only a couple of kids each year at the highest level who would even explore this avenue."

-Kevin Anderon of SI.com: "I would have great trepidation going over to foreign soil at that age," Louisville coach Rick Pitino said. "But he'll make a considerable amount in his year not in the NBA. The pro scouts will follow him just the same as any college player. It's just growing up in a hurry. Physically, he'll do things their players don't."

-Dan Shanoff of The Sporting News: "Nevermind that if Jennings was in the NBA Draft -- the 2008 NBA Draft, mind you -- he would have been a lock 1st-round pick, perhaps even top 10. Nevermind that the system of college coaches, NBA scouts and mainstream pundits will rush to crush him for doing exactly what he should be doing. Ironically, the least cynical actor in all of this is the kid. Everyone has ulterior motives in this; at least his are transparent: His goal is to play professionally -- and the NBA undoubtedly wants him -- but the system won't allow him access to it."

-Eamonn Brennan of The Dagger: "It goes without saying that Jennings' decision is a huge risk, but I said it anyway just then in case it wasn't clear. The common concerns are as follows: He'll get eaten up in European ball; his draft stock will drop; he'll become a casualty of lower profile; living in Europe will take a mental toll on him. Etc. With all due respect, these concerns seem about as realistic as this football simulation." Continue reading...

Brandon Jennings to Europe - What Does it Mean?

So it is officially official now - Brandon Jennings will be skipping college to play professional basketball in Europe for a year before he is eligible for the NBA Draft. In a statement released through his lawyer, Jennings said

Over the course of the last two months I have consulted a number of people in basketball before coming to this decision. I would like to thank the University of Arizona for their interest and support through this process.

Jennings expects to earn hundreds of thousands of dollars in salary and endorsements, and has enlisted former shoe promoter Sonny Vaccaro as his advisor.

Ok, so now that we've laid out the basics, let's look at what this decision means. I've written in depth about it before here, but depending on his success in Europe, this could be a landmark decision. Hell, he might not even be the last one of the class of 2008 to go abroad (Demar Derozan still has not been declared eligible, although he is not considering Europe at this point). If Jennings performs well, earns a bunch of money, and maintains or increases his draft stock (most sites have him as a top 5 player in the 2009 draft, and the second point guard after Spain's Ricky Rubio), then why wouldn't more players follow in his footsteps? Spend a year playing professional basketball in Spain, or Greece, or Italy? Who wouldn't want to do that?

Think of it like he is doing a year studying abroad, with his major being basketball.

Seriously though, which way is better for an 18 year old who has been idolized since middle school to develop some maturity and responsibility - send him off to a college campus where he has to attend sleep through class for one semester, he is the target for numerous agents, runners and other unsavory people, and lives on or near a college campus where trouble, frat parties, and sorority girls are never hard to find; or spend a year playing professional basketball against grown men, who could care less about your "hype" and would like nothing more than to prove themselves against you (be it with a basket or an errant elbow), in a country where you don't know anyone, don't speak the language, and don't get treated like a superstar everywhere you go. I'll go with the latter.

There are some risks for Jennings. European basketball is a much different style. They expect their point guards to set up the offense and be distributors, which is not his forte. Jennings is a creator and a play maker, and needs the ball in his hands to be effective (I don't want to say shoot-first, because he is a good passer and unselfish - think Chris Paul). He is also much more effective in the open court. Not many teams across the pond play that way. European teams also have a tendency to not play their young stars (especially if they are a rent-a-player like Jennings will be).

Look, I love college basketball more than anything - that is why I spend a ridiculous amount of time working on this blog with almost nothing in return (just click on some ads!!). If recruits do start to follow Jennings lead and head to Europe, it will be a bad thing for college basketball in the short term, but could be a very good thing in the long term. Maybe this is what it takes for the NCAA and the NBA to get rid of the ridiculous one-year rule.

The rule is essentially in place to ensure that players in the NBA draft will be recognizable and marketable when they are picked. But if the top prospects start heading to Europe to play, then the NBA will lose the marketable players - if Derrick Rose led Maccabi Tel-Aviv to the Euro finals last year, would the general public have been as interested in the Rose-Beasley debate?

Jason Whitlock wrote a great article on the exploitation of college basketball and football players, which - if you have read this blog before you should know - I completely agree with (although I think he brings race into it a little too much, but it's Whitlock, what do you expect). Basically, what he is saying is that if we are going to force these kids to go to college for a year, then why keep up the fallacy of calling them "student-athletes"? Why do we force them to go to classes that, for the majority of these players, will have no effect on them?

These kids generate so much revenue for the NCAA, their schools, and the networks that air the games (CBS and ESPN), but don't see a (legal) dime for their effort (what value does a scholarship have to a one-and-done player). Isn't there something wrong with that?

Whitlock proposes two solutions for this problem:

1. Acknowledge that college basketball and football players are entertainer-athletes, not student-athletes. Bring them on campus, pay them, free them of academic responsibility and let them entertain students, alums, boosters and fans while auditioning for a pro career.

2. Form an alliance with the NFL and NBA and invest in education/athletic academies for talented young basketball and football players (of all colors) beginning in eighth and ninth grade.

The NCAA pays its basketball and football players with a currency (education) many of them aren't prepared to spend or value. That has to change, and it's incumbent on the NCAA to be a big part of the change.

I don't care how solution No. 2 jibes with Title IX. Is there something in our Constitution that states a TV contract driven by (mostly) black basketball players must be used to fix America's history of sexism? The money can't be used to educate basketball players when they're 13, 14 and 15 and there's a chance of getting them to a level where they can compete academically in college?

I agree with both of these, especially the first one. But I would take it a step further. Why not make basketball (or football or baseball) a major? I mean, for most of these guys it is the career that they are pursuing. No one has a problem if a pre-med student only takes science classes and doesn't take, say, an english class. And what's more, these schools can actually educate these athletes in areas where it could actually help them.

If you read Some Links, Some News yesterday, then you know that an absurd number of professional athletes end up broke - for reasons varying from scams to bad investments to plain old dumb spending decisions. Why not educate them on how to spot a scam or a fraud, or how to manage and save their money, or what a good investment plan could be? Part of the reason 60% of NBA players are broke five years after they retire is that they spend a huge amount of money in fees by hiring people to take care of things like money management, simply because they do not know how.

This is the kind of education that these kids need, and it is the kind of education that will benefit them even if they are only there for one year. And if the classes are presented in a way that makes it seem like not only will the education provide protection against losing their money, but actually net them a higher return on what they will already be making, I bet you actually get some of these kids paying attention in the classroom. Continue reading...

Brandon Jennings to Europe! It's Official (maybe)

So reports are coming out of Arizona that prized recruit Brandon Jennings did not receive a qualifying test score, and will now be headed to Europe (or maybe the D-League) for a year until he is eligible for the 2009 NBA Draft. It is only a source, and it is the East Valley Tribune (not exactly ESPN.com reporting this), Wildcat fans may still have hope, but it looks like Chase Budinger's work load just got a lot bigger next year. Continue reading...

Brandon Jennings: Trendsetter?

Numerous media outlets (including myself) reported over the weekend that Brandon Jennings, the consensus #1 recruit in the country committed to Arizona, was looking at the Euroleague as a fallback option in case he didn't receive qualifying scores on the SATs. Well, it looks like spurning Tucson may not be simply a fallback option after all.

Gary Parrish of CBS Sports spoke to Kelly Williams, Jennings' advisor, and what he had to say probably did not comfort Wildcat fans:

"In all honesty, I think Brandon wants options," Williams said by phone. "If he has the opportunity right now to make $800,000 from a team and get a shoe contract and make more than $1 million before he even goes into the draft, then why wouldn't he do that?"

It is a very good question - why wouldn't he? What can he gain by going to college? He gets to go through the farce that is a one-and-done players academic regimen (sleeping through classes, having tutors help him with do his work for him). Add to that that Jennings, as well as the coaching staff, athletic department, and school in general, will have to worry about every "extra benefit" he receives, hoping to avoid the negative press and impending punishments that USC currently faces, all while the school is cashing in the checks from merchandise revenue, ticket sales, and tournament bonuses as a result of Jennings' basketball ability and star power.

Does that sound more attractive than playing professional basketball in Italy, or Spain, or France for a year, making upwards of (or more than) a million Euros (which at this point is like, what, $2 million)?

David Stern and the rest of the NBA's Front Office suits can talk until they are blue in the face about how 17 year old high school seniors are too young to be drafted or how the NBA Draft's age requirement helps protect NBA team's because it allows them to have a full season of scouting while the player's are at college. In fact, the new rule actually hurts the scouting of draft prospects because NBA teams are no longer allowed to watch these kids play in high school, which is part of the reason this draft is so wide open and unpredictable right now. Read this quote that SI.com's Ian Thomson got from an NBA General Manager picking in the lottery:

"A lot of people are under pressure in this draft. There's going to be a couple of guys who go after the first two in the lottery who will be potential All-Stars, and a couple of young guys picked way back in the 20s who will be really good, and one guy in the second round whom everyone misses on.''

The problem, he went on to say, is that no one can tell the future stars from the potential stiffs. The reason for this uncertainty?

"The age of the players,'' he said. "These players used to come out of high school or even after two years of college. Now the rule is that they have to play one year of college, and that's what a lot of them are doing. We aren't allowed to watch them in high school anymore and so we're trying to judge them based on one year of college. It's not enough. Not being able to watch the high school players is really hurting us. Otherwise, we'd all have better knowledge.''

The only reason that Stern has put in the horsesh*t rule is because he wanted NBA teams to stop drafting high school players that noone has heard of and instead draft college athletes who have already made a name for themselves. Do you think there would be as much debate over Beasley vs. Rose if they had both been coming out of high school? Would Oden vs. Durant have gotten as much pub if neither had stepped foot on a college campus?

This rule is also good for the NCAA. Before the age limit, the best high school players in the country were completely skipping college, but now the NCAA gets a year to showcase these stars. So basically, if you are a high school star, the NBA forces you to play a year in college, where the NCAA and universities exploit these kids, profiting of their ability to put fans in seats (in front of a TV or in a gym) and jerseys on the backs of fans, simply in order to increase their marketability before they reach the professional level. This only furthers the argument that college players should receive some type of income (and don't give me the whole "they are receiving a free education" argument when you know damn well the best players won't be there for four years or have any intention of graduating).

So back to the original point, this could be a landmark decision. It is a tough one, however. Jennings', although supremely talented and athletically gifted, does not really fit the Euro style of play - he is a flashy penetrator that likes to get up and down the floor. Combine that with the language barrier and the fact that he will be playing with physically mature, grown men, and there is a possibility that he could hurt his draft stock if he goes abroad and does not perform well (then again, he may go to Arizona and stink up the joint).

On the other hand, Jennings' would be going into a situation where he would be a professional - where his life wouldn't revolve around staying eligible, it would be entirely focused on the sport that will become his career. He will be living in another country, which means he will have to learn to be responsible and mature in his decision making, both regarding his sport and the money he will be making. If you are an NBA GM, isn't this the kind of education you want your top prospect to be getting? Or would you rather him learn how to do a 30 second keg stand and bring home sorority girls?

If Jennings' does end up playing in Europe, it would be interesting to see if this establishes a trend among top high school prospects. On paper, it doesn't look so bad. Continue reading...