Starting a Pro Basketball League in India

anilkumar · Post by **anilkumar** » Sun Jan 30, 2005 1:57 pm

There has been lots of thinking in formulating a Pro League for Basketball in India. In fact, Basketball has several strong fundamentals in comparison to many sports- most number of inter school tournaments, most number of teams at the inter university men/women events, attracts crowds in several towns across India ,etc etc.
But the game lacks a professional administrative system.
Ideas of floating a Pro League are now open and funding has been the major issue obviously. The fact remains that actually funding is only secondary, its the structure and concepts that is thrown up which decides the pattern of funding.
Sponsors come in only when they see the concept of the event in toto. Why is the Indian hockey and Football leagues taking time to really take off despite new concepts........any answers......Basketball cannot afford the same mistake.
People are working on it.............we look to all ur views on how such a league should be structured and concieved.....Any ideas?

amr090 · Post by **amr090** » Sun Jan 30, 2005 6:37 pm

well the ideal structure is obviously that of the NBA, the most successful professional sports structur eint he world. in terms of marketing, as well as product its really unmatched and has international appeal.

Kumar · Post by **Kumar** » Sun Jan 30, 2005 7:12 pm

I think any league that is being proposed should have a minimum number of teams with best players .. With lot of teams we can hope to gain widespread publicity, but I think quality will suffer..

As per amr suggestion, may be structuring it in NBA mould is a good idea.. But the main problem is sustaining spectator interest.. So we need very high quality teams that are evenly balanced (reason NFL is popular in US when compared to other sports league - parity).. Also the rules though needs to be similar to Intl. rules, we can probably tinker with them to increase the scoring (Scoring definitely drives the audience interest)... no one is interested in 54-53 slugfest..

BSharma · Post by **BSharma** » Mon Jan 31, 2005 4:32 am

NBA is a great model to emulate but one must do research to find what will work in India.

Many factors will be important for a professional league to be successful in India:

- It must be run by "true" professionals.
- Proper marketing.
- Start from cities where basketball is more popular and then expand as the league prospers.
- Educate the parents of the children who are interested in basketball. Remember who pays for the tickets! (a case in point is the problem faced by soccer in USA).
- Decent facilities (I am not asking for NBA type facilities).
- Make a superstar out of a star. Superstars bring in the crowd not stars.

anilkumar · Post by **anilkumar** » Mon Jan 31, 2005 3:37 pm

Lets get to specifics.....going the NBA way is an easy suggestion. What are the basic norms to be set up.....what should be the implimentation concept?
Basketball has the charm to attract crowds on its own. What can keep the crowds coming to the games.....thats the key point we are looking at. If it were u at the helm, what would ur thinking be on the TOP 3 important must-do-points on this?

BSharma · Post by **BSharma** » Mon Jan 31, 2005 4:44 pm

If it were u at the helm, what would ur thinking be on the TOP 3 important must-do-points on this?

1. Research
2. Research
3. Research

No venture will succeed until you do the proper background work.

Find out:
- what has worked well or has not worked well in other basketball leagues in Asia and other parts of the world
- what has worked well or has not worked well in comparable sports leagues in India (e.g., hockey, football)
- what do the Indian public, players, sponsors, journalists, TV officials, etc want
- how much money will it take to get this venture off the ground and how much money does the league has or can get from the bank, sponsors, etc
- what kind of basketball facilities are available and what else is needed

anilkumar · Post by **anilkumar** » Wed Feb 02, 2005 12:30 pm

Veru True......Research and home work is perhaps the all important priority.

Having done some research on these lines in my own ways, a Business model is being evolved to float a League on a Franchisee system with 8 cities to start with.
The League owner and the Franchisee would follow the limited company concept of ownership with shareholders as club members.
The franchisee area could be regional or state basis to develop a sense of ownership and the investment would range between 20 -25 lacs to start with per franchisee and the rate of return breaking even during the 3rd year of operations.
Sponsors want all the media attention which wud come if things are made glamorous. Basketball in India needs a mix of music and entertainment attached to it rather than mere technical games. Its exciting by itself....and we need to make it much more so.
The infrastructure support is very much there, its a question of whether the idea would be taken up.
I know that the details mentioned are insufficient but can this be used as a skeleton to get the ball dribbling forward.

BSharma · Post by **BSharma** » Wed Feb 02, 2005 4:18 pm

I am excited that pro-basketball league in India might take off in the near future.

Sponsors want all the media attention which wud come if things are made glamorous. Basketball in India needs a mix of music and entertainment attached to it rather than mere technical games. Its exciting by itself....and we need to make it much more so.

There is no harm in adding music and entertainment into the mix if the goal is to get more people into the stands. Even the Super Bowl in USA has a multi-million dollar entertainment package during the halftime. The lower division leagues in baseball, ice hockey, American football, basketball, etc use entertainment to draw the crowd to their facilities in USA. However, one has to be careful that the entertainment does not become the "main" course that is served to the public.

I know that the details mentioned are insufficient but can this be used as a skeleton to get the ball dribbling forward.

If done correctly, it can be a slam dunk deal.

Good luck.

ataank · Post by **ataank** » Sun Feb 20, 2005 7:00 am

Hi Anil
Great to hear about your views on a pro basketball league. I am totally for it. I also beleive that not just basketball but as many of the olympic sports should have their league present here. PHL done a good job. Similar ideas can be mooted for other disciplines to make them more entertaining for greater viewership. Also I have presented some ideas for General strengthening of the sports bodies in my document vision 2020 in the same section. Do go about reading them.
Do let us know about any progress if any towards the formation of such a league.
Regards
Amit

anilkumar · Post by **anilkumar** » Sun Feb 20, 2005 2:41 pm

Yes Amit...I went thru ur document and have also posted my comments therein.
I frankly appreciate the IHF for making the start with a PHL.
But I feel it needs fundamental restructuring and thats where the Basketball League can take off only when ownership concept finds takers.
Or else, it would fizzle away after a few years oncethe sponsorship dries off( which obviously will)
Which are the best cities for promoting Basketball teams in India for a Pro League?

Post by **Dhruv** » Sun Feb 20, 2005 5:02 pm

anilkumar wrote: Which are the best cities for promoting Basketball teams in India for a Pro League?

You'ld have to do some market research. The important considerations should be

1) Popularity of the sport * Population of the city (for viewership)
2) Geographical concerns. In India it becomes very difficult and expensive to fly teams from the North to the South every week just to play a game or two.

Despite people suggesting using the NBA model that is probably the wrong model to choose, given the state of development of basketball in India. What makes the US model a success is the great NCAA system and local school system in place. If the goal is make a successful pro-league rather than just a developmental league then you need to look at what competition there is out there for talent.

If the Railways or Services or Police etc will employ players then you need to be able pay the players their basic salary that they would get working at these various organisations + the NPV of all the future salary they would lose out on by not working there + take care of retirement concerns. Thus getting players to play in the league would be an expensive proposition and you need to get the financials down first. i.e. Have an idea how much money a team would have to pay for the basics (stadium rental, office staff, travel etc etc) and then how much it will have to pay for player salaries and then see if you can cover this with the possible revenues. Just back of the envelope calcs using estimates tell me that this would be extremely difficult to do without significant sponsorship agreements in place or deep pockets willing to take loss after loss esp. a lot of travel is involved. I don't know how far you have gone down this path but I would seriously visit the financial feasibility of this project as that in itself will narrow down the cities where you should focus upon. You will almost surely need TV coverage etc. into account.

A lot of the critisism of the PHL has been that it was in one city etc. and not a league but a tournament and such like. I find it difficult to see a scenario in which the teams could have played a home and away series like they do in some other leagues and still manage to remain profitable. The football league is blessed in the sense a almost 75% of the teams are from Calcutta or Goa so the travel for a lot of the teams is minimal which helps them with costs.

I think a lot of the questions you have asked would be answered if you looked into the financial aspect of running the league. As potential leagues to have a look at I would recommend it are the Chinese Basketball League and the Australian Basketball league.

Sorry if sound as if I'm being too harsh but I'm not trying to knock down your idea, just trying to give some suggestions and the info you have posted doesn't seem to the give impression that a lot of homework has been done or we don't have enough info to give really meaningful suggestions.

anilkumar · Post by **anilkumar** » Tue Feb 22, 2005 12:38 pm

Yes Dhruv.....I understand.
India is not ripe yet to start of a Pro League and I understand ur apprehensions of necessary back up thru college level and school level activity.
But as u rightly pointed out, we need to copy the foreign leagues by adopting a simple principle of being choosy of what to copy and what not to, based on the Indian scenario.
Whether the economics is on the right side, we will come to that at the next stage.
About the cities based on popularity and infrastructure, i look at it as:
Hyderabad, Vizag, Chennai, Coimbatore, Bangalore, Kochi & Calicut .
For the 1st phase- these 8 cities to cut on costings.
Regarding the employeed players willingness, we will be adopting a simple approach of compensating them for the Leave period only( ranging from 60-75 days) and thus reducing the commitments substantially.
I am working on the economics based on such internal adjustments.
What haunts me is whether these cities ( or similar) will take on to an idea of owning a team based on a business model which would ensure a positive balance sheet only by the 3rd year of operations at the earliest.
Lets handle point by point for better clarity...

anilkumar · Post by **anilkumar** » Fri Feb 25, 2005 5:05 pm

As a prelude to promoting a Pro Baskteball League, I am in the process of working on a proposal of bringing the Harlem Globe Trotters Basketball Team to India in 2005.
The economics is being worked out and things should be getting hot during March when I may be able to give more info on this forum about the dates, venues ,etc.
I myself am not too sure how well Indian crowds will recieve Harlem, the tour being fixed after a gap of almost 2 decades.
.........Does the proposal seem exciting to all sports lovers?

BSharma · Post by **BSharma** » Fri Feb 25, 2005 8:08 pm

I have watched the Harlem Globe Trotters Basketball Team a few times on TV and they are very entertaining. I do not know how well they will be liked by the general public of India but the basketball fans in India will enjoy their game.

anilkumar · Post by **anilkumar** » Sat Feb 26, 2005 3:39 pm

Its more of entertainment rather than Basketball and thats the need for a lift to the status of BB in India. Thats exactly y we r working on them. Can someone "guestimate" what would be a resonable ticketing rates so that the stands are full and the event bubbles thru. Also, which would be the ideal 5 cities in India for such a venture having the infrastructure and the spectator backup for a Harlem show.

The Sports-India Community