With more people than ever tuning in to watch the British Basketball League at home and record attendances at games, it seems as though British basketball is going in the right direction.
However, the BBL and British basketball in general is still miles behind the rest of the world when it comes to the sport.
TIBS News investigates how the BBL and British basketball can grow.
Continued television coverage
With Sky Sports announcing that they will cover the BBL for yet another year, this will only be good news for basketball fans here in the UK. This has, and will continue, to introduce new people to the game as they flick through channels and stumble upon British basketball.
However, Sky Sports is a paid channel and with the cost of everything rising, the price to watch British basketball is only going to skyrocket. Therefore, meaning less people will pay for the additional channels that will show basketball – but instead opt to purchase packages with channels that show more popular sports, such as football.
This also presents an opportunity for basketball to grow in this country. Channels that are free to watch, such as the BBC and ITV, should swoop in and share coverage with Sky. For example, Sky Sports could have most league games with BBC/ITV showing the play-offs or cup games. Exactly how they split football with the Premier League being shown on Sky and the FA cup being shown on the BBC.
This free-to-watch basketball will encourage more people to watch the game and take a real interest in it, as they do not have to pay. With slight adjustments to the BBL’s schedule, tip-off times could be altered on a Friday night to be around dinner time (after the news), which would bring even more viewers on a free channel. More viewers would mean more money from advertisements and sponsors, and then more money into British basketball allowing it to grow financially.
Funding
Funding is a very broad term but more money into basketball within the UK is one way that the BBL can be seen as a legitimate league. Funding into specific areas such as open indoor and more outdoor courts could massively improve the BBL.
Money gained by either earnings from the BBL or Basketball England and even Government loans, should be used to simply build more courts. One reason football is so big and ingrained into our culture is the sheer simplicity of it and how you only need a patch of grass to play it on. If more outdoor courts are made and put up in most parks or even small sections of fields made into a court, more people will start to play basketball. This makes basketball more accessible for the casual player and gets them intrigued into playing for a team. As a consequence it will make Basketball England earn more money – allowing them to give more money to the BBL to advertise or even attract bigger and better talent from abroad.
Indoor courts are another area that need to be better funded. The average amount someone would need to pay to rent a court for 2 hours here in the UK is anywhere between £150-£300. This is ridiculous. By building more indoor courts and even taking an American approach by having them in the same building as a gym, would see dramatic improvements. Therefore, an indoor court would be less of a rarity and the prices to get on to one could be dramatically lowered. This would allow the truly dedicated basketball players to train and get in some good work in good conditions; meaning the level of youth leagues and the local and nationals leagues will increase, giving BBL teams more options of home talents. Therefore, they would not need to spend big on foreign players and would build a stronger nation of basketball players, strengthen the national team.
Funding would also need to go into advertisements and gaining more viewers, but this was discussed above.
More teams in the BBL
Adding more teams into the top league is an on the head way of growing as there is quite literally growth: more teams and players. However, the reason the BBL would need more teams is due to boredom and stalemate. With only 10 teams in the league, and a huge skill gap between the top four/five compared to the rest, games become boring. With certain winners in some games and a few big games a year, viewers will get bored quickly.
Therefore, introducing a few new teams to the league and maybe incorporating a regulation system into the National league could be an area for the BBL to investigate.
To introduce new teams into the BBL they, like mentioned, could promote teams from the National Division 1 league. This would mean there isn’t such a big difference of skill and make for more competitive games between those lower down in the BBL. A financial reward could be given to newly promoted sides in order to allow them to bring in talent allowing them to compete with the BBL teams.
However, the BBL would need to re-think their criteria for teams applying to be in their league. At the moment, there are numerous obligations that a team must meet before being able to join the top league. Such as, a venue with adequate capacity and a strong youth and development set up to mention a few. If these rules are changed and rethought in order to allow more teams in, the BBL could see much success.
Another drawback though would be that there is not enough engagement and viewers to justify money being spent on new BBL teams. This is a valid point and is why teams should be moved up from the National league rather than creating a whole new franchise in a random area of the UK.
In summary…
Overall, for British basketball and the BBL to grow, more money is needed within the sport. The game I love isn’t what most of the UK enjoy watching and therefore basketball will be pushed aside in order to cater for the large amount of football viewers. Basketball engagement and viewership are on the rise and is going in a good way, but to be as big as it is in other parts of Europe and of course the NBA, more funding and money is need in all aspects of the game, from right at the top in the BBL to the outdoor courts at the local park.
By Jamie O’Sullivan
