Dear Adam Silver: Major League Soccer can help you fix the NBA’s competitive balance problems
Bring the David Beckham Rule to basketball!
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Dear Adam Silver,
This is my second open letter to you — the first was on how to stop Draymond Green’s assault on other players’ private parts — this letter is on how to get a step ahead of his team’s assault on the competitive balance of the NBA (instead of remaining “light years” behind them). And just so we’re clear, I am a fan of dominant teams playing high level basketball — give me Cavs-Warriors, Part IV next season!! However, because you and so many others are worried about parity in the NBA — why don’t you give the following some thought?
As you are no doubt familiar, last spring, Warriors’ owner Joe Lacob excitedly exclaimed that his organization was “light years ahead” of the rest of the NBA. A few months later, karma in the form of LeBron James and Kyrie Irving intervened and punished Lacob for his hubris. It was a wonderful two weeks for all non-Warriors fans.
However, because the Warriors are actually “light years ahead” of the rest of the NBA, a mere two weeks after blowing a 3–1 lead and losing Game 7 of the NBA Finals, they flipped the script, got their Game Genie on, and signed the second-best player in the NBA — a move that would not have been possible under the current collective bargaining agreement (“CBA”).
As you have made clear, you were not a fan of this move as it severely damaged the competitive balance of the NBA. Thus, in late-2016, a new CBA was reached and aimed directly at preventing 4-star “SuperTeams” like the Warriors from ever forming. This, of course, was a reactionary move that did nothing more than create an even larger gap between the Warriors and the rest of the NBA. It was akin to teacher telling her class that their test would be an open-book test, but then only allowing the smartest kid in the class to actually use his/her book during the test.
But at least it will be too expensive for the Warriors to retain their key role players like Andre Iguodala and Shawn Livingston in the coming seasons, you thought. Wrong. Kevin Durant, in what could become a precedent for other superstars (hold that thought), gave the Warriors close to a $10M discount. A very unselfish and admirable move by Mr. Durant (then again, Conspiracy Pat can’t help but wonder if Nike or Joe Lacob promised to make up the difference with a “pay it forward” type promise 🤔). Thus, the Warriors were were able to not only re-sign their important role players from last season, but they were also able to add talents like Nick Young and Omri Casspi to their roster with the extra money left over!
So the Warriors are just going to dominate and win every title the next five years while the rest of the NBA waits for them to get old, right? Wrong again. As seen by the moves made this off-season, the good teams and great players have no plans of waiting out the Warriors reign — they are going to do everything in their power to challenge the Warriors. Hell, three-fourths of the Western Conference made “win now” moves this summer. Imagine what is going to happen next summer when LeBron James, Paul George, Russell Westbrook, Boogie Cousins, Chris Paul, Dwyane Wade, Carmelo Anthony, etc. are all free agents and hungry to dethrone the Warriors?
Here’s my prediction, Adam: Superstars are going to see what Durant did and take it to the extreme — we might see the whole Banana Boat Squad sign for the veteran minimum with the Lakers so the Lakers can also sign Russell Westbrook and Paul George. We see your SuperTeam, Warriors, and raise you a SuperDuperTeam.
There’s literally nothing stopping this from happening. The non-Warriors superstars in the NBA are ultra competitors and borderline ego-maniacs — they’re not going to sit around and allow themselves to get embarrassed for the rest of their careers. No, they are going to intervene and game the system at some point. They’ll team up and take discounts (and tell Nike execs and Jeanine Buss to make it up to them down the road).
Once again, in my mind, this would be highly entertaining. However, I’m guessing that many of your smaller market teams — such as the OKC Thunder, Utah Jazz, Memphis Grizzlies, etc. — will not appreciate every star bolting to a big market team to try to win a championship.
How can you avoid this happening while still keeping the NBA competitive?
Institute a “David Beckham Rule” (a/k/a Designated Player Rule)
This rule created a loophole in the Major League Soccer (“MLS”) salary cap that allowed teams to pay world renown superstars (e.g., David Beckham) free market salaries, but have his salary only count as a smaller percentage of the team’s salary cap. For instance, when Beckham signed his “quarter-billion” dollar deal (click here for an explanation of the actual terms of the contract) with the LA Galaxy in 2007, his salary cap hit was only $400,000 of the allotted $2M salary cap (20%). Each team had one Designated Player Slot on their roster and, for a couple of seasons, could trade their Designated Player Slot to other teams.
Now, the NBA obviously doesn’t have the same uphill battle of competing with European leagues like the MLS, but . . . what if you applied the Designated Player concept to the NBA’s CBA with the following parameters:
- Designated Player deals are up to 5 years in length, but are completely unrestricted otherwise— e.g., Russell Westbrook and the Thunder could agree to a 5 year/$300M deal if they so desired;
- Each Designated Player counts for 20% of the team’s cap space;
- A player is eligible to be a Designated Player after playing for 5 seasons in the NBA and at least 2 consecutive seasons with his team;
- Each team gets 2 Designated Player Slots (“DPS”) on their roster, but can acquire up to 4 total DPS; and
- Teams can trade unused DPS and can put year restrictions on traded DPS — e.g., the 76ers know that Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons aren’t eligible for a Designated Player deal for another couple of years, so they can trade 2 years of each DPS to another team and the DPS will automatically revert back to the 76ers after 2 seasons.
What problems does this proposed David Beckham/Designated Player Rule “fix” for the NBA?
№1 : It appeases the superstars. Guys like LeBron James see billionaire owners getting filthy rich from recent TV deals and often wonder — tell me why my salary is capped off and Dan Gilbert’s isn’t?
I remember Bill Simmons wrote in 2013 that in an uncapped league (like MLB) LeBron would make close to $75M per season. How much did he actually make that season? $17.5M — seems like LeBron has a point.
№2: This eliminates superstars like Kevin Durant from taking below market deals during their prime to free up cap space for their team (not to mention likely being rewarded for it handsomely by their owner the minute they retire — which is against NBA rules).
№3: This gives the small-market teams a chance to retain superstars, but still allows players to get out of bad situations with teams. For instance, if the Jazz could have offered Gordon Hayward a 5 year deal/$225M deal, do you think he leaves for Boston? Probably not — the money is too good and the Jazz are an up-and-coming team.
At the same time, say the Pelicans, who have mismanaged their cap space horribly, offered Anthony Davis a 5 year/$300M deal this off-season, do you think he takes it? Possibly not — he’s young enough that he can sign with a new team, play his 2 seasons, then get his Designated Player deal there without having sacrificed too much of his earning potential.
№4 & №5: This is where it gets fun. Say you are the Magic right now. You have zero players eligible/worthy of either of your DPS. So you call up the Warriors and say “Hey Bob Meyers, it looks like you have four superstars, but only two DPS. How about we trade you 3 years of both DPS for 3 future First-Round picks and Patrick McCaw?” Therefore, the Warriors would be able to give two 5-year Designated Player deals to Durant and Curry and two 3-year Designated Player deals to Klay Thompson and Draymond Green.
This would help make the NBA more competitive because the Warriors would only have 20% of their cap space left to fill 11 roster spots and thus, would probably have to let an important piece like Iguodala walk in free agency. At the same time, a team like the Magic could use their DPS to acquire draft picks and young talent so that, by the time the DPS they traded to the Warriors expired, guys like Aaron Gordon and Johnathan Issac may have developed into DPS-worthy players.
This idea still needs to be fleshed a bit, Adam — like, what happens when the Knicks sign Melo to a 5 year/$250M deal and want to trade him after one season (looking at you Phil Jackson)? Does he need to be bought out before he can be traded or does the Designated Player contract operate as a no-trade clause? Those are details that you can nail down — I’m just an ideas man and, for the first and only time in my life, I’m telling you that the NBA needs to be more like the MLS.
Sincerely,
