NBA's new Europe-based league could launch in October 2027, though that remains uncertain

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MILAN (AP) — The NBA is targeting October 2027 as a potential launch date for the new Europe-based league that it and FIBA have been working to make happen, a league official said Friday.

NBA Europe managing director George Aivazoglou, speaking at a conference in Milan, said the first season of the new league might be described as “a semi-opening,” indicating that not all of the slots in the planned 16-team league could be allocated at that time. NBA officials, including Commissioner Adam Silver, have been saying 2027 or 2028 were the working targets for a launch.

The 16-team model calls for 12 permanent franchises, Aivazoglou said. He listed current target countries as Britain (with the potential host cities there being London and Manchester), France (Paris and Lyon), Spain (Madrid and Barcelona), Italy (Rome and Milan), Germany (Munich and Berlin), Greece (Athens) and Turkey (Istanbul). No deals with any city or club have been formally announced by the NBA at this point.

The other four teams in the league could qualify by winning either FIBA's Basketball Champions League or through their performance in domestic leagues in Europe, Aivazoglou said.

That possible element — having teams qualify through their domestic league finishes — “is probably the most exciting part of the plan, because we all know that the domestic leagues today are not necessarily what they had been 20 or 30 years ago," Aivazoglou said.

It's unclear when the NBA could announce anything formally about the launch date or the initial list of franchises. The NBA is sending the Orlando Magic and Memphis Grizzlies to play in Berlin and London in mid-January, and it seems possible that some news about the new league would be announced on that trip to Europe.

Aivazoglou's comments Friday were among the most concrete yet regarding the NBA's plans and timetable for the new league, though it should be noted that talks are continuing with teams, investors and other stakeholders.

“We’re well underway in our approach and engagement with the market," Aivazoglou said. "We're having serious discussions with respect to investors.”

Also being discussed, Aivazoglou said, is having teams from the NBA and Europe meet in some sort of competition, possibly similar to what soccer governing body FIFA has done with its Club World Cup.

“One of the things that we’ll do very soon after we launch this league is probably create a new tournament,” Aivazoglou said.

The NBA and FIBA, basketball's world governing body, announced plans in March to pursue a new European league — ending years of speculation about when or if such a move would happen. The process has been moving rapidly and a substantial move earlier this year came when the NBA brought on JPMorgan Chase and Raine Group to advise on finances and strategy.

Existing European clubs like Real Madrid, Fenerbahce and Barcelona have long been known to figure into the NBA’s plans for the new league, along with other top soccer brands like Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain.

About one in every six current NBA players hails from Europe, including Denver’s Nikola Jokic from Serbia and Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo from Greece — a duo that has combined for five of the league's last seven MVP awards. The Los Angeles Lakers’ Luka Doncic is from Slovenia, and San Antonio superstar Victor Wembanyama is from France.

“I think our basketball people now are very engaged in how the competition will work,” Silver said in September, when asked about how the plans for a European league are progressing. “Our lawyers are thinking hard of how we can take a system that’s now known to U.S. sports as sort of a cap-based system and a revenue sharing system with players and how we can apply that in a European framework. Nothing is easy here. There are reasons why this hasn’t been done before. But I think we’re up to it, and again, the response has been tremendous.”

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Reynolds reported from Miami.

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AP NBA: https://apnews.com/nba