GET IN THE GAME! The National Basketball Development League (NBDL), the NBA’s minor league, is looking for talented basketball players for its inaugural season. If you will be at least 20 years of age before November 2001, there may be opportunities to play professional basketball with the NBDL. To be considered for one of our eight NBDL teams, please send an e-mail with your name, address and phone number to nbdlplayers@nba.com. A player information questionnaire will promptly be sent to you.
“And then, Milt Newton will come evaluate you.”
That line isn’t in the above-mentioned ad that appears on the NBDL’s Web site, but probably could or should be.
Newton, a starting forward on Kansas University’s 1988 national championship team, is director of player personnel for the fledgling eight-team league, which opens play this winter.
It’s Newton’s job to stockpile players for the NBA’s version of baseball minor leagues. He also will be responsible for having reserve players on hand during the course of the season, which will encompass a 56-game schedule from mid-November through March.
“Let’s put it like this: I envision our league having the type of players that have the potential to play on the NBA level but need to work on their jumper or ballhandling skills,” said Newton, who spent the past six months splitting time between his New York City office and college arenas across the country where he scouted games.
“I am scouting guys who have the potential to make it the next year or the year after that. I have been very busy building our database full of potential players.”
Newton, 35, knows how to evaluate talent.
He served as a Philadelphia 76ers scout before accepting the NBDL job a year ago. He also has worked for USA Basketball, which provides basketball opportunities for college standouts.
“I’m still scouting, just on a broader scale,” Newton said.
He’s not prepared to sign anybody yet for the league, which will have all eight teams based in the Southeast. So far, the league has announced sites in Fayetteville, N.C.; North Charleston, S.C..; Mobile, Ala.; and Huntsville, Ala.
“What will happen in our first year is the NBDL will sign every player to go to a central training camp,” Newton said. “Once they go there, they will work out and play games. Based on their play, our coaches will draft those players in October.
“It will be an invitation-only camp,” Newton added. “If it was an open camp, we’d have too many guys 1,000 guys. That’s too many players. A lot of guys think they can play, but can’t.
“A possible scenario is somebody signs with us, goes to an NBA camp. If he gets released and signs with us, he comes to our training camp.”
Newton said the league is prepared to pay players between $27,500 and $30,000 per year.
The likely candidates for admission are second-round NBA draft picks who are cut by NBA teams or individuals who have been out of college a year or two playing in other pro leagues.
“It’s not a league where guys will make $100,000 a year,” Newton said. “It’s about developing your skill so you can go to the NBA and make that kind of money.”
This league is not designed to gobble up high school seniors who have no desire to attend college.
“We take no players under 20. The only way you can play in our league and be under 20 is if you were a first-round pick of an NBA team and get cut,” Newton said. “Then we put you in our league because, at that point, your options to go to college are gone.”
The league is serious about developing NBA players.
Former NBA players Tiny Archibald, Alex English, Sam Vincent and Bob Thonrnton have signed on as coaches.
“Our coaches will be teachers of the game, ones who know the game,” Newton said.
Newton is a believer in the league.
“Of course the league will make it, because we have the backing of the NBA,” Newton said. “We have the resources of the NBA we can utilize to make it strong. It’s owned by NBA all the teams. You could say all 29 teams have a stake in each team.”
It’s curious the league picked the Southeastern part of the country for its franchises. Teams will play in arenas that seat between 7,000 and 10,000 fans.
“We’re trying to develop the grassroots of basketball in that area,” Newton said. “There’s not yet an NBA brand of basketball in that part of the country.”
But isn’t that part of the country football country?
“I wouldn’t say that,” Newton said. “I personally think basketball can catch on anywhere in the country and in the world.”
Newton doesn’t think the NBA’s minor league will kill leagues like the CBA and USBL.
“I don’t know about that. There’s enough talent to go around,” Newton said. “We’ll have eight teams and 11 players on a team. That’s 88 players. There are thousands and thousands of players out there.”
Newton says this has been his biggest professional challenge to date.
“There’s a lot of things to be done in terms of putting a league together,” Newton said. “Some days when I sit in on meetings it seems like I don’t know what they are talking about. I always leave our meetings thinking I just learned something new.”
He said his desire to be a college athletics director had evaporated.
“When I was younger, I wanted to be an AD. Being an AD has gotten away from what it used to be. It’s not attractive anymore,” Newton said. “This is a great situation for me professionally. It allows me to continue to grow. I tell my friends this is like getting a business degree from Harvard without going to Harvard.
