New Era Basketball Association

[Dan K]

It looks like the NEBA is again trying a nationwide league.

http://www.officialneba.com

[dmbishop]

Yup. Kevin has been hard at work on it for quite some time. It's a little different from the standard minor league in that he is very seriously focusing on using the league as an exposure platform for the players instead of just using the players as a way to make the owners money. Games are available on ESPN3, Netflix, and other platforms and are also being shown in Europe where Kevin has a lot of contacts.

Final schedule will be out this coming week.

Dave

[Minor League Mania]

I took a look at the site and saw a release that the games would air on something called BOP TV but no mention of the other sites you spoke of. The site certainly looks better than the previous ones he has had.

I wish Kevin luck. It is hard to put together teams that are not really close together in travel.

[dmbishop]

I might have spoken too early about Netflix.

The league is set with 18-20 (already paid up) teams with a national footprint in both mid and large markets. The schedule will run from November to March.

Dave

[dmbishop]

The NEBA New Years Classic is set for Saturday, January 9th in Burlington NJ.

Triple-header of games; Detroit vs Boston, Raleigh vs DC, and NYC vs Philadelphia (in prime-time).

Catch it live on the EA Sports online channel. If you miss the live action catch it again on Monday, January 11th on Apple TV and Netflix.

More details to follow...

Dave

[jaykay]

So this league is competing directly with the D-league?

Wouldn't it make more sense to have a league during the summer which can compliment the D-league and European leagues?

[dmbishop]

No, the NEBA has no plans to compete directly with the D-League. In fact, one of our main goals is to give players an opportunity to move to the D-League (and hopefully the NBA).

The league will actually begin playing games in November, which I know coincides with the D-League, but there will be opportunities for teams to bring in additional players later in the year after the Euro leagues and D-League finish their seasons.

Dave

[jaykay]

Let's say an over the hill former NBA player that is desperate to play again and wanted to use the NEBA as a platform to get back in shape and be exposed for a potential NBA comeback..would you accept that player?

[dmbishop]

I would say "never say never" (there are sometimes very sound business reasons to do so and independent leagues in all sports sign those players on occasion), but that's not the type of player we are looking for.

The NEBA is not interested in the 38-year-old can-barely-make-it-up-the-court former NBA player as a quick PR boost. We would take a serious look at a player who was in the NBA for a year or two, dropped down or out (injury, etc.), and is seriously looking to remake his career.

We want younger players who didn't make the D-League / NBA and are looking for a place to get exposed to move up, either to those leagues or Internationally. And with players that are already playing Internationally, the NEBA is a great place to get domestic exposure.

Dave

[dmbishop]

Hi OSC,

We (OK, I) have made a lot of changes to the NEBA Website at http://www.officialneba.com since I took over. Although there are some platform limitations, a tremendous amount of additional information has been added.

By the way, all of our teams have their own individual websites, jointly run by the league and the team owners. They use the same basic template as the main league site. Yes, we will have a link to the team sites up shortly.

What I would like is for you people here at OSC, many of you with extensive minor league sports experience, to take a look at the site and tell me what you think about it (good OR bad) and where and how we could improve it.

Thanks,
Dave