By Aris Barkas/ barkas@eurohoops.net
The Raffles Hotel in London was a posh setting, selected from the NBA for their private event, which was probably the biggest ever investors’ gathering about European basketball.
However, the history of the building, the old war offices, where iconic personalities like Winston Churchill and James Bond creator Ian Fleming resided, might be much more fitting for the occasion, on what is about to become a new division in European basketball with many unknown variables yet.
FIBA secretary general Andreas Zagklis, together with NBA commissioner Adam Silver, was present, and a huge number of investment funds were also in attendance, eager to learn about the new project.
Still, funds can’t play basketball. So the presence of sports organisations might be more important, since they will form the league in which the investments will be made.
Per Eurohoops sources, in most cases, the clubs were present to conduct their due diligence, and while many of them were directly and informally approached by investors, the fact that there’s no info yet about the potential revenues of the project, but talk only about the obligations of the clubs, which would want to become permanent “franchises” including the rumored 500M euros entry fee, makes things complicated.
Obviously, nobody wants to close the door to the NBA, and that’s why EuroLeague shareholders like Panathinaikos, FC Bayern Munich, Real Madrid, FC Barcelona, and EA7 Emporio Armani Milan were there. According to The Athletic, the NBA also had a special meeting with Fenerbahce last week, while according to Eurohoops sources, the NBA has also made contact with Olympiacos, but the club was not invited to London.
Those clubs are established in the markets that the NBA wants to be the anchors for their European project, but right now, none of them has any kind of deal.
Αs it’s already been reported, the NBA wants to have 12 permanent franchises, two in the UK, two in France, two in Spain, two in Germany, two in Italy, one in Greece and one in Turkey.
Only one team secured in the UK and France
In theory, the UK is the easiest target for the NBA since the whole professional basketball landscape in the country is changing, with a special FIBA task force overseeing it.
The NBA has decided on the markets and the arenas, O2 in London and Co-op Live in Manchester, and now needs to find the teams, which may be part of the still elusive domestic GBBL league.
According to the BBC, both Manchester United and Manchester City are not interested in creating basketball sections, but according to The Athletic, representatives of Manchester City were present in London for the event. No word yet for London.
In France, things are clear. Tony Parker made one of the presentations of the NBA to the investors on Monday, as well as Pau Gasol and Zlatan Ibrahimovic, on behalf of the RedBird Capital Partners.
So LDLC ASVEL, whose contract with the EuroLeague expires in June, is expected to be part of the NBA Europe, probably with the club being sold, at least partially, to a new investor.
The other big bet is Paris. Per Eurohoops sources, Paris Basketball at the moment is excluded from any talks with the NBA for a variety of reasons, so the obvious target is to lure PSG into the fold, as Adam Silver openly said. There’s no reaction yet from Paris Saint-Germain, other than that in the past they have admitted that there are talks.
The EuroLeague shareholders
Despite their presence in the event, Panathinaikos, FC Bayern Munich, and EA7 Emporio Armani Milan have already signed their new 10-year licenses with the EuroLeague. Of course, there’s an opt-out clause of 10M euros, which can be used, plus maybe extra fees for damages, but at this point, they can’t outright commit to the NBA, even if they wanted to.
The fact that AC Milan, which is also owned by RedBird Capital, was there, maybe shows a path of how this transformation might become with a merger, or a new a bussiness vehicle. This would also mean selling the club at least partially to a fund, or, in the case of Bayern Munich, creating a different private company only for the basketball section of the club, something that would also be applied to Real Madrid, Barcelona, and Fenerbahce if they would like to join the new project as permanent franchises.
Panathinaikos is already a private company in the basketball section, which has no financial connection with the football section of the club or the amateur sports, so this makes their case even more interesting on a financial level.
The “free agents” and the revenues question
Real Madrid, Fenerbahce, which was not present, and Barcelona have not yet signed their new 10-year licenses with the EuroLeague. However, Fener and Barca seem to be EuroLeague-bound with the Catalans signing the new contract in the next few days.
On the other hand, Real Madrid is considered the locomotive of the new project, a perception that already created outcry among the fans of the club and seems to be willing to create a private company for the basketball section specifically for this project.
With Barcelona not willing to commit to the second Spanish spot, the NBA may be tempted to approach Valencia, which doesn’t have the same brand but owns one of the best, if not the best, arenas in Europe and currently has a three-year commitment with the EuroLeague, expiring in 2028.
In Turkey, outside Fenerbahce, one of the biggest clubs of the country, Galatasaray, seems eager to participate in the project.
In Germany, ALBA wants to be the team of Berlin, and the NBA wants Bayern to be their team in Munich. Adam Silver praised ALBA during his press conference in Berlin; they are already part of the FIBA basketball ecosystem after leaving the EuroLeague, but as the Athletic noted, the move to NBA Europe will happen with the influx of capital from new investors.
So all that leaves as a question mark the possible team in Rome, which is considered a key market in Italy for NBA Europe, even if, as Iacopo De Santis reported, Napoli has met with the EuroLeague and is expected to meet also with the NBA. Rome might be more attractive market-wise, but it doesn’t have an established top-level team.
But still, as it was mentioned before, what makes all the European clubs that are connected with the EuroLeague sceptical about the new project is the revenue aspect.
And Adam Silver’s press conference in Berlin, where he admitted that the league will not be profitable initially and compared it with the WNBA, made things even more complicated, considering what the new league asks from their “franchises”.
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