By Fahim “Coach Fah” Nassar

The 2023-24 NBA Season is fastly approaching. There is great anticipation for this year’s campaign. We have plenty of young stars on Team USA this summer, going against the world’s best. We have the Victor Wembanyama hype train currently rolling through social media like a typhoon. There is the Dame to Miami buzz, the Phoenix Super Team, another year of LeBron and the Lakers, and of course the ever-
engrossing drama of James Harden.

One thing that is not getting as much traction, however, and may be its brightest idea yet- is the NBA’s newest wunderkind- The NBA Cup.

What is The NBA Cup? I will get to that. Before I do, let us walk though a wonderful history of changes throughout the NBA, starting with its creation.

Since its inception in 1946, the NBA has gone through several drastic changes in the way it operates, and how games are grown and advanced. Most people do not remember the highly fundamental early NBA where teams like the Harlem Globetrotters were a consistent main attraction, and the NBA had the less stellar games.

This was a league where flash and pizazz were considered showboating and was frowned upon. It was much a suit-and-tie affair.

The creation of the ABA is where much of today’s flair and exciting plays came from. It was the ABA that allowed dunks and high-flyers, as well as snipers from three-point range. The NBA also expanded its teams from 11 in the 1946-47 season, to 17 in the 1949-50 campaign. By 1980 the NBA had 23 teams. In 1995 the league jumped to 29 teams. Today, there are 30 teams with 28 G-league developmental league teams to coincide with most franchises.

In other words, the game has continued to evolve into the juggernaut that it is. Unfortunately, as with every empire, some blood does spill and while some things change for the better, others do for the worst. The NBA is no exception.

During the decade of super-teams, star players moving franchises, egregious flopping, predictable finals outcomes, load management etcetera. The NBA has taken some serious hits. Some agree that a part of the luster was taken out of the game and many who were once devout consumers of all things NBA began to falter.

Not to mention, over the last twenty years the average sports enthusiast has been given many different outlets for sports and other content. Attention spans are lesser. The populace has therefore decided to tune out NBA games at a certain point in the year, after the glimmer of the start of the season fades into the minutia of November. The weather deteriorates and so does the viewership.

As the NBA works its way back to the top of the mountain a few things were realized. One of them being that once the season begins, there is a lull in viewership between November and the Christmas Day. Another is that teams took the foot off the pedal closer to playoffs and teams that were on the outside looking in may begin to tank for draft position (a solid strategic strategy by my estimates) rather than fight for the final playoff spots.

This led to poor ratings and even less excitement for the playoffs unless
your team (or favorite player) was one of the prohibitive favorites.

The latter issue was solved a few years ago with the invention of the Play-In Tournament. This is a tournament for the final seventh and eighth spots in the playoffs. Positions one through six are safe but seven through ten fights for the last two spots. This has brought more attention to the last few weeks of the playoffs as now those tanking teams have a chance. Though it is still being consider an adjustment by fans, most have embraced this new wrinkle.

With that in mind, the NBA’s brainchildren came up with a way to entice not only viewers, but players themselves to take the early regular season seriously. The NBA Cup!

The NBA Cup is an “in-season” tournament featuring your favorite teams in “groups” to do battle over a stretch of Tuesdays and Fridays throughout November into December, where there will be group stages, knock out rounds and a championship game. There is a monetary prize along with bragging rights.

Compensation Time!
Per CBS Sports.com
 Players on a team that loses in the quarterfinals: $50,000
 Players on a team that loses in the semifinals: $100,000
 Players on a team that loses in the championship: $200,000
 Players on a team that wins the championship: $500,000

Now, while winning the NBA Cup doesn’t speak to the Larry O’Brien Trophy, it does incentivize the role players as well as the starters to be a part of these games (no player empowered leave days so to speak). The hope is the competitive nature of these world-class basketball assassins will take over and the in-season cup will be desirable for all. It should also invigorate fan bases who may honestly tune out during this part of the season.

While the idea will most likely garner side-eyes and ho-hum comments, there is also a belief that this will be entertaining and will catch on, not as an ugly, gaudy monstrosity, but as a delicious set of spicy nuggets to go along with your NBA Super Meal.

Either way, the season starts in Oct and the NBA Cup will be a part of it. For better or worse, Adam Silver… we will be watching.

*Photo courtesy of Instagram