The NRL Is At The Same Place The NBA Was In The 1980s

By DAVID HAYWARD

MODERN day NRL is positioned very similarly to how the NBA was in the 1980s which gives much hope for its future, provided it can effectively navigate the issues that continue to hold the sport back from growing beyond its heartland.

Over the past 30 years the NBA has catapulted basketball to comfortably be the second largest sport in the world behind football. Four of the major aspects that pulled the NBA out of the mire in the 1980s included stumbling on a generation of young marketable athletes, making a tough stance on drug abuse, reducing the incidence of rough play and embracing global markets through the internet and expanded international play.
The marketable athletes that the NBA were fortunate enough to receive in the 1980s, to name a few, were the likes of Michael Jordan, Hakeem Olajuwon, Charles Barkley, Scottie Pippen, David Robinson, Shawn Kemp, Gary Payton, Karl Malone, John Stockton and Clyde Drexler. These players paved the way for an engaging and exciting style of play that captured the imagination of sports fans across the world for the next decade or so.
The parallel for the NRL is the generation of Queensland State of Origin players that landed in the NRL’s lap in the early 2000s. This is the most underrated reason why the NRL has grown so much since then and kept in front of rugby union in Australia. 2003 was a dark time for rugby league in Queensland, Allan Langer had retired with no strong replacement in sight, other star Queensland players had left to play for the Wallabies, the Brisbane Lions had won the AFL flag three times in a row and were drawing 10,000 fans more per game on average than the Broncos and NSW dominated Origin between 2000-2005 almost turning it into a non-event. If Cameron Smith, Darren Lockyer (the five-eighth version), Billy Slater, Greg Inglis, Cooper Cronk and Johnathan Thurston didn’t happen, rugby league could be in a more perilous state in 2017. As their careers come to the end, the NRL must be planning for life without them because without them it feels like 50 per cent of the good news stories will be ripped out of the game.
In terms of drugs, cocaine and materialism became prominent in America’s culture in the 1980s. With athletes’ salaries and profiles increasing, drug use was reported as being a major issue for the NBA. After a series of players being caught and subsequently punished in the first half of the decade, the issue peaked with commissioner David Stern placing a lifetime ban on star guard Michael Ray Richardson on the failing of his third test in January 1986.
However, this firm stance did not stop the tragic death of Len Bias occurring just six months later and one day after he was drafted number two overall in the draft by the defending champion Boston Celtics. Bias was regarded has having the ability to be another version of Michael Jordan and was well-placed to ensure the Celtics dynasty would continue for years to come. However, his overdose sent shockwaves through the NBA and America.(continued below)


As tragic as Bias’death was and as strong a stance the NBA had taken just prior, it did not stop players using drugs but the league’s firm stance did not hurt players or the sport, rather it did much enhance player welfare and improve the image of the sport. The NRL is in a similar situation right now, there is enough evidence in recent years to suggest cocaine is being used far too much by people within the game, how strongly it responds to recent events will play a role in not only enhancing player safety but also cleaning up the image of the game to people in new markets which is vital if the sport is to grow in the future.
The 1980s was dominated by Magic Johnson’s Los Angeles Lakers, Larry Bird’s Boston Celtics or strong defensive units that often resorted to rough tactics. This also was reflected in the NRL in the 1980’s through the dominance of the Parramatta Eels and Canterbury Bulldogs as well as low-scoring, defence oriented matches. Today, even though the NRL has tried to reduce the severity of physical contact to let attacking play enhance the spectacle, the NRL continues to be dominated by similar dour and tough defensive units of the Cronulla Sharks and Melbourne Storm.
The NBA is arguably the most successful sport in the world in terms of its global TV reach. It has gone from the NBA playoffs having a delayed telecast in the 1980s throughout America to now having almost everyone in the world with the ability to watch every single match live on their smart phone. It has also gone from treating the international competitions with disrespect by sending only college players to represent the US at the Olympics or world championships, to introducing the Dream Team in 1992 which has led to the Basketball World Cup and Olympics being able to sell their tournaments with the most marketable national sporting team in the world.

Currently the NRL disrespect the international game by prioritising Stage of Origin and clogging the calendar with 26 weeks of regular season matches to appease clubs’ demands of hosting 12 home matches per year (even though they are played in sparsely filled stadiums) and TV broadcasters (even though very few people watch outside of NSW and Queensland). Interestingly, but not surprisingly, the recent Australia-New Zealand Test outrated the AFL on Friday night for the five capital cities (something an NRL match had been unable to achieve in 2017) and the three Pacific Tests out rated the Super Rugby on the Saturday evening on Fox Sports by a factor of three.
With the NRL’s culture consistently trashed by player behaviour and a series of soft penalties, you would have to say it has the worst reputation of the major sporting codes in Australia, much like the NBA in the early 1980s. The big difference between the two leagues though is the NBA had the luxury of being a globally recognised sport which it has leveraged to great effect.
In turn, with a strong stance against drugs, marketing their best athletes and embracing globalisation, the NBA salary cap has increased from $10m (2016 USD) in 1987 to $94m in 2017. Sure the NRL will never reach this level of salary cap but these are the key ingredients of the NBA’s success from the 1980s that the NRL must embrace.
If the NRL is to increase its revenue and salary cap at all into the future it must make the strongest stance against drugs for all sporting codes in Australia in order to gain more respect in new markets and establish more marketable athletes. Further it must recognise that less is more in terms of NRL club matches as it can declutter the rugby league calendar and open opportunities to let the international game flourish and be more effective at driving revenue growth.