Today's Edition
KUUMAR SHYAM (ABU DHABI)
David Watts, the head of the National Basketball Association (NBA) supervising the game in the Middle East, has said the initiatives in the growth process in the UAE are part of a multi-pronged approach into a pyramid structure.
Watts spoke to Aletihad exclusively on the sidelines of unveiling a refurbished basketball court in Zayed Sports City, an initiative by the Abu Dhabi investment holding company ADQ where some young children went through the paces of an exhibition game to mark the seemingly small initiative.
Promotion of basketball has been evident in the recent years with two NBA teams coming down to play pre-season games, the launch of Jr. NBA has ensured a full-fledged school games programme, besides more courts being opened.
On another front, and unrelated to Watts’ remit, the EuroLeague basketball has tied up with Abu Dhabi authorities to host the Final Four, the equivalent of the Play-offs, this year in May while “Experience Abu Dhabi” has become a sponsor partner for the main league as well as the Euro Cup. A level below, in the Adriatic Basketball League, the UAE has a team representing – Dubai Basketball – and already making waves in the inaugural season.
“Obviously, the highlight is the six NBA Games [pre-season] we have had over three years and hopefully in the future we’ll be holding quite a bit more where we bring the teams, the excitement, the celebrities and some major legends at that. We also have a huge grassroots programme, that starts out with Jr. NBA League where we have 30 copy the 30 NBA teams; we even have a draft, playoffs and a final where we even have a Championship ring that we hand out. We’ve also held multiple clinics every time we come.
“We did Basketball Without Borders (BWB), which is a collection of 30-50 of the best talent from different parts of the world. We’re hoping to do more programmes like that. We are also doing initiatives for more courts, more tournaments, more community engagement,” said Watts even as the kids gathered approached the end of their game on the new court.
With such organic but long-drawn vision in practice, when can the Middle East expect to see a NBA player emerging from the local market?
“To a certain extent, it’s a numbers game,” Watts said. “So I think we started relatively low base and now we’re building and building. There is no magic formula for having an NBA player. It’s literally having enough players and they continue up what we call our pyramids. So that is the very grassroots from kids just literally holding a basketball to getting involved.
“This leads to these elite camps like BWB and they can spread out in different programmes. We’re also discussing with various companies, stakeholders and governments the way we can increase that participation. You can see in the growth of the NBA used to be mainly America, with some Canadians. Now we have about a fourth of our players from around the world including, I think, three or four of our last MVPs [three in the past six years on the trot] are non-Americans.”
Watts welcomed initiatives such as Dubai Basketball’s rise while adding that the sport is spreading to the Arab-speaking base even as he would like to add a missing element like having academies in the region.
“We’re always looking for ways to collaborate. It really doesn’t matter. We’re all trying to grow the game together. One of the top parts of the pyramid before you get to professional level is what we call academies. We have them around the world, and we’re looking seriously into doing something here. I think it would be a great place. It has the infrastructure.
“It is long-term, but it’s what we have to do as the NBA. I mean, our core mission is to inspire, connect, move through basketball. We have around the world 300 or 350 million Arabic speakers. So we’ve opened Arabic speaking channels so people can connect with the NBA that way. And again, there’s no magic formula. You need to stick it out and continue... I think we count, last year we connected with 11,000 kids through all programmes, starting out from zero if you go back four years,” Watts said.
