OT: Apparently, college basketball is as bad as ever.

[tarheelhockey]

1) Players going straight from High school was an exception not the rule. Hell they only made the one and done rule because so many high schoolers had agents getting into their head that they were better then they were and skipping college despite having no chance to be drafter in the first round and an iffy second rounder at best.

Nevertheless, it's what an entire generation of star players chose to do. Kobe Bryant, Kevin Garnett, Lebron James, Dwight Howard, Tracy McGrady, Amar'e Stoudemire, Jermaine O'Neal, Shawn Kemp, Stephen Jackson, Monta Ellis all came into the league without ever playing college basketball. Only in the last few years could you say the NBA is really supplied by the NCAA and even then it's only in a very minimal one-and-done kind of way.

2) Well it helps that there are only 2 rounds in the NBA draft then waiting til the 3rd round plus in the NHL to take the project or unknown from Europe

What difference does that make? There are twice as many roster spots in the NHL and there are 2 tiers of minor leagues, of course the NHL draft is going to be longer. Overall, 75% of the NHL is from North America compared to 82% of the NBA. It's not a huge difference.

3) Its still a very public showing that kids get from even that one year in college. Plus with how public high school scouting is the basketball watching public know who to watch for before hand and watch them from the first game on.

Honestly, you're talking about serious hardcore fans who would follow high school players from other states. Like, the basketball equivalent of HF.

Anyway, Mathradio's original comment was intended to mean that college = NBA when it comes to the players involved. That is not at all the case. Only a fraction of college players go on to the NBA, and only a fraction of the NBA has long and relevant college careers. With a few exceptions per draft, the two are only nominally connected by the age requirement.

 

[member 96824]

There are a lot of things in this post which are describing the NBA as it existed a decade ago or more.

1) "The college game is the only place players from North America are coming from" - This is partially true of recent draftees, but as recently as 2004 there were 8 high-school picks in the first round. The current crop of NBA superstars (Bryant, James, Howard) were high school selections. And even now, with an age limit in place, you still have guys going to the D-league or Europe rather than college.

The europe thing only happened with Jennings cause he was too dumb to get into college. I'm talking right now though, I do realize many great players came from high school last decade when it was allowed, but right now...nba players come from college hold 5-8 drafties from europe a year.

2) "There are fewer Euros drafted than in the NHL" - 2009 was the first year in a long time that the NBA drafted fewer Euros in its 2 rounds than the NHL drafted in its first 2 rounds.

What? It happend in 2008(NHL- 12, NBA-9) and 2007(NHL-11, NBA-11) just going back the two years before that. But it's no secret at all that the NHL is a much more diverse league than the NBA...especially as far as stars go.

3) "The majority of names you'll recognize go onto the NBA" - 16 of the top-5 picks since 2006 were freshmen or sophomores (and 2 were from Europe). Most of them went to college only to satisfy the NBA age requirement. By the time you recognize a player, he's gone. It's hard to call him a "product" of NCAA basketball in any substantial way... he's only had a cup of coffee there.

But still, if you say Brandon Knight this year, Derrick Rose, Greg Oden, Kevin Durant, Blake Griffin, OJ Mayo, Kevin love, Michael Beasley, etc. They were household names during their college year. They may have only got their feet wet, but they were college stars (hold Oden who barely freaking played)...they're names you recognize, they're in the nba. Yeah the solid role players on college teams will go to europe to keep playing, but to say the vast majority go to europe is false...and to use JJ Redick going in the "second round" was also completely false.

 

[MayDay]

The league's contraction in Canada would be a considerably better way to put it.

Since 1980, the NHL has lost two Canadian teams (Winnipeg and Quebec) and gained two (Calgary and Ottawa).

What contraction?

If Winnipeg and Quebec had teams

...we'd start hearing calls for teams in Hamilton, and Saskatoon, and Halifax, and so on.

 

[tarheelhockey]

What? It happend in 2008(NHL- 12, NBA-9) and 2007(NHL-11, NBA-11) just going back the two years before that.

No... in the first two rounds of the 2008 NHL draft there were 9 players from overseas (Filatov, Karlsson, Gustafsson, Tedenby, Tikhonov, Markstrom, Voinov, Josi, Kugryshev).

In the 2 rounds of the 2008 NBA draft there were 11 (Gallinari, Ajinca, Ibaka, Batum, Pekovic, Asik, Jawai, Tomic, Dragic, Dragicevic, Erden).

11 > 9

In the first 2 rounds of the 2007 NHL draft there were 5 (Eller, Cherepanov, Backlund, Gistedt, Hjalmarsson).

In the 2 rounds of the 2007 NBA draft there were 12 (Jianlian, Belinelli, Fernandez, Splitter, Fesenko, Barac, Yue, Gasol, Seibutis, Newley, Printezis, Rakovic).

12 > 5

But it's no secret at all that the NHL is a much more diverse league than the NBA...especially as far as stars go.

This comment flies in the face of the numbers right in front of you.

Yeah the solid role players on college teams will go to europe to keep playing, but to say the vast majority go to europe is false...and to use JJ Redick going in the "second round" was also completely false.

Those comments must have been made by someone else...

 

[Melrose Munch]

Since 1980, the NHL has lost two Canadian teams (Winnipeg and Quebec) and gained two (Calgary and Ottawa).

What contraction?



...we'd start hearing calls for teams in Hamilton, and Saskatoon, and Halifax, and so on.

So there used to be 8 Canadian teams and now there are six. Thats what your statement says.

 

[HabsByTheBay]

Since 1980, the NHL has lost two Canadian teams (Winnipeg and Quebec) and gained two (Calgary and Ottawa).

What contraction?



...we'd start hearing calls for teams in Hamilton, and Saskatoon, and Halifax, and so on.

Wow, that is an extraordinary piece of intellectual dishonesty. Well done you.

 

[Dado]

Since 1980, the NHL has lost two Canadian teams (Winnipeg and Quebec) and gained two (Calgary and Ottawa).

Uh...what?

Are you trying to say they gained four, and then lost two, for a net gain of two?

 

[htpwn]

Since 1980, the NHL has lost two Canadian teams (Winnipeg and Quebec) and gained two (Calgary and Ottawa).

What contraction?

Since 1990, 1 Canadian team has been added to the league, 8 American teams have been added during this time (two at the expense of Canadian cities).

...we'd start hearing calls for teams in Hamilton, and Saskatoon, and Halifax, and so on.

Yes you would continue hearing cries for another Southern Ontario franchise. Why? Because the area should probably have two franchises. After that though, I think you will see very few people pushing for teams in smaller locales such as Halifax and Saskatoon.