After giving fans the opportunity to see more of top prospect Victor Wembanyama by announcing that all of this season’s Boulogne-Levallois Metropolitans 92 games will be available to watch for free on the NBA app, the league is taking a similar path with consensus No. 2 prospect Scoot Henderson.
According to the NBA, a series of G League Ignite games will be available to stream for free on the NBA App this season. The league announced that Henderson and the Ignite will be featured on the app eight times in November and December during the NBAGL’s Showcase Cup, starting on Friday — the Ignite will host the Oklahoma City Blue – the Thunder’s affiliate – tonight in the season opener.
Neither Wembanyama nor Henderson is taking the traditional U.S. college route that most top picks have in the past, opening the door for the NBA to take unique steps to market two players who have the potential to become perennial All-Stars in the league within the next few years.
Here are several more odds and ends from around the basketball world:
- Danny Leroux of The Athletic takes an early look at which teams do and don’t project to have cap room during the summer of 2023, identifying the Rockets, Pistons, Spurs, Magic, and Pacers as some of the teams with the most flexibility.
- Former NBA lottery pick Jimmer Fredette, who didn’t have much NBA success but became a star in China, now hopes to be part of Team USA’s 3×3 basketball team for the 2024 Olympics in Paris. Veteran broadcaster and analyst Fran Fraschilla is coaching the U.S. team and recruited Fredette for the qualifying process, including this week’s AmeriCup, writes Tim Reynolds of The Associated Press. “I think Jimmer, unfortunately, was never in the right places in the NBA that valued what he can do,” Fraschilla said. “He can give us six to 10 weeks a year and he’ll have a great shot at being part of our Olympic team if we qualify.”
- Las Vegas Aces head coach and former Spurs assistant Becky Hammon is joining ESPN as an NBA studio analyst for the 2022/23 season, as Richard Deitsch of The Athletic details.
- Sam Yip of HoopsHype takes a look at the NBA players who took the biggest year-to-year pay cuts in league history, starting with Celtics big man Blake Griffin.
The G leauge with young guys is starting to take over the NBA in the way they the old D league did with veteran guys back in the mid nineties thru about 2003.
The leauge is turning into an under 28 model.