New York Knicks forward Carmelo Anthony isn't concerned about raising the maximum salary or increasing the players' share of revenue in the upcoming round of Collective Bargaining Agreements.
Instead, Anthony told Ramona Shelburne of ESPN that he wants to rebrand the NBA Development League toward exactly that purpose - development.
"If I had it my way, I'd rebrand the whole D-League," Anthony told ESPN. "I'd rebrand it so it's not seen as a punishment."
Anthony, who serves as vice president of the National Basketball Players Association, has seen first-hand the benefits of having a development academy through his ownership of a soccer franchise in Puerto Rico.
"I'm a big advocate of developing our own players. If you look at soccer, for example, a lot of those clubs have top-notch academies," said Anthony. "By me being in soccer now, I've started to understand the dynamics of developing your own players. We've got to keep our players here. We don't want them to have to go overseas."
As it were, the D-League is already gaining in popularity. There are 22 teams with affiliate clubs, up from last year's tally of 19. Innovative franchises such as the Houston Rockets and the San Antonio Spurs were among the first to reap the rewards of using the D-League to incubate and discover talent, and now the rest of the league is starting to follow suit.
Anthony would like to see all 30 teams have their own minor league team, and an increase in salary for D-Leaguers. Current salaries (ranging from $19,500 to $26,000) is not competitive with European and Chinese league wages, which often prompts fringe players to go overseas.
The next CBA is expected to include "two-way contracts" that would allow for players to be on both D-League and NBA rosters, which would thereby create an additional 44 to 60 jobs, according to ESPN's estimates.
