Basketball On The Internet.

THE NBL's decision today to turn its annual All-NBL Teams into "positionless" - that is, not two guards, two forwards and a centre or similar, but just the five so-called best players - is a typically ill-conceived retrograde step, reinforcing league boffins do not care or understand the fact basketball is a team sport, and instead will bow to whatever is populist at the time.

There is no concession among present league management toward understanding the sport or what it takes to create an elite team. What the NBL understands is $$$.

The NBL is no longer about the sport first and hasn't been for a while now. It is about entertainment first. Fair enough I suppose, but it has forgotten basketball is an entertaining sport, NOT sports entertainment, a la the Harlem Globetrotters or the various WWE and AEW wrestling companies.

Having a great point guard or a versatile centre is as much a part of basketball as having five players who can switch defensively on every screen.

Marquee names may get us to games but it is the sum of the five guys and the way they combine together which creates the diversity and excitement that differentiates our sport from every other. 

That is precisely why an All-NBL Five should reflect the sport - this TEAM sport - by identifying who were the best players in their positions.

It's about - or should be if it isn't - the five players you'd want to start for the NBL in a non-restricted real match, were such a thing ever on the table.

It's that simple and as any coach will tell you, the five best players will not necessarily constitute the best five-man combination. There are myriad examples of this and for Naismith's sake, we even have a well-worn saying for it: "A champion TEAM will always beat a team of champions."

That's what sets apart the All NBL Team. It's a team. It's NOT necessarily your competition's five best players.

Truly, if you only care to know who the NBL's five best players are, that's already there and easy to define. They are the guys who finish 1-to-5 in the Most Valuable Player voting.

You want to know the next five best "positionless" players? It's those guys who finish 6-to-10 in the MVP vote.

It isn't rocket science.

Present the first five and second five votegetters in the MVP and you already have what the NBL now is attempting to adjust by tampering with the All-NBL Five.

Because they don't truly understand the sport - just the potential $$$ it can yield - they cannot recognise that the MVP (top 5 votegetters) and the All NBL Five are two different categories.

It is a team sport. But then, NBL management has never been a team player.

PS

What is positionless basketball, really? 

I know it's the new rage - if not New Age - thinking in basketball, but what does it mean?

Anyone who even semi-understands the game knows having versatile players - those who can play multiple roles and positions - is an absolute Naismith-send and huge advantage.

But it isn't the be-all and end-all. Chris Anstey was that type of asset as a player. At 7-foot he was quick and a killer inside. But he also could drift out and stick threes in your face.

Oppositions were caught watching him beat reluctant big guy defenders from range or off the dribble, or post up smaller guys that dealt with him better at the arc. He was a nightmare matchup.

That said, Melbourne Tigers didn't win the championship every season he played. There was room for other body types too, little guys dating back to Cal Bruton also have dominated our NBL.

And yes, it is terrific that big guys such as a Nikola Jokic or Giannis Antetokounmpo - in the NBA by the way, NOT so much our NBL - can stick the long ball. But remember, they are generational talents.

Just like Steph Curry. They don't come along every day.

This "positionless" mantra seems to emanate most from those taller players who want to avoid pigeon-holing, or so it would seem. Sometimes it could just be a case of wanting to play outside instead of wearing the bumps and bruises of the low blocks.

(Like us now lazy old farts playing social basketball, we prefer to take threes too, rather than work for a a tougher inside basket.)

But if it's so positionless, why are teams with quality point guards thriving right now? Would Tasmania prefer to have Will Magnay making the decisions or Jordon Crawford? Why does Sydney want the ball in Jaylen Adams' hands to initiate the last play, not Jordan Hunter?

They're not interchangeable??

No, they're not. But they complement each other's games.

Youth coaches rushing to embrace "positionless" basketball in fact may be doing their kids a disservice. Not teaching a big how to post up because he wants to sit outside, probably will limit that career down the line. So will not teaching a shorter kid - who may yet grow - how to play inside.

Again, positionless and versatile are not the same.

Having multiple versatile players is a huge boon, no question or argument.

But positionless basketball will only really be a thing when everyone on your roster is 6-9, has a great inside/outside game and quality handles, capable of playing every role, such as Magic Johnson. And our sport has been filled with heaps of Magics, right?