Happy Birthday NBA!
In June 6, 1946 the predecessor of the NBA, the Basketball Association of America (1946) was founded. It had Maurice Podoloff as the President and had 11 original teams in its league.
The first game of the BAA was played at the Maple Leaf Gardens (in Toronto) between the New York Knickerbockers and the Toronto Huskies. The Knicks won 68-66 with the crowd attendance at that game reaching 7,090.
Later on, in 1949, it merged with the National Basketball League and with the resulting merger the NBA was formed.
The Initial Members of the League were:
Eastern Division:
- Washington Capitals
- Philadelphia Warriors
- New York Knicks
- Providence Steamrollers
- Toronto Huskies
- Boston Celtics
Western Division:
- Chicago Stags
- St. Louis Bombers
- Cleveland Rebels
- Detroit Falcons
- Pittsburgh Ironmen
A lot can be said about the BAA that was said to be ground breaking for the game of basketball. In 1947 they introduced the Draft for college players while in 1954 they added the 24 sec shot clock. The benefit of the shot clock was that it added more excitement to the game by preventing ball hogging to run off the clock. They also widened the shaded lane because of Wilt Chamberlain’s dominance of the game, so as to level the playing field for the other teams. Didn’t seem to work though as it didn’t really stop him from posting huge numbers every night.
Another huge paradigm they broke was when they allowed minorities to play in their league. The first of which was Wataru Misaka, a Japanese-American player from the University of Utah, who was drafted by the New York Knicks in 1947. This was later followed by African-American players who were allowed into the league in 1950.
When the Olympics finally allowed professional players to represent their countries, the NBA didn’t hesitate to allow its stars to represent the USA in the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona. This in effect helped to boost further the popularity of the game through out the world.
On a personal note, I learned the game in 1992 when players like Jordan, Barkley, Pippen, Ewing, Olajuwon, Miller, Stockton and Malone bannered the league. Shorts weren’t that long yet back then (with Jordan being the originator of the baggy shorts trend). I also missed the first and second championship of the Bulls because I wasn’t “aware” yet of the professional game nor the greatness of Jordan. But like every young “buck” I finally awoke to the enjoyment of watching the greatest game on earth. Not to mention the experience of watching it being played at the professional level. Courtesy of the NBA.
Source here
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Tags: NBA