Draftees Age Limit: Break Our Dreams?

In response to Metsis' essay, the issue is not the gamble you take when drafting someone that age, rahter the impact on the person and culture it creates and changes.

If age is no factor, then would you allow 16 or 17 year olds to enter the league? If the hundreds of thousands of young kids playing basketball all over the country see these kids getting millions of dollars, that lifestyle suddenly seems much more practical and easier to achieve. If a kid who plays for his middle school team and dominates the other 14 year olds sees 16 year olds making the jump, suddenly the journey to the pros doesn't seem so difficult. If the same kid sees that it will take him at least two years of college to develop his game and get an education, he knows he has to work hard to finish his high school education before he can ever get to that point.

Yeah, most of the kids aren't ready for it and they certainly cannot comprehend the money involved in professional sports. And the jump, is only big in the US... Okay, it's a huge leap every time, but as I've said, guys in international competition could have been playing against grown men from the age of 14-15... It does mature your game a lot faster than playing with people of same age. So in theory, a 16 year old kid could be ready for anything on the basket ball court. In theory... In reality, the body is probably not developed enough to play professionally and that likely goes with the mind as well... I saw some LBJ footage and he wasn't all that tall and muscular at 16, but he added height and weight rapidly between 16 and 17 years of age... Thus he was so chiselled at 18. And the fact that his muscular training was coached by a professional that works with NBA athletes... I think Leandro Barbosa works or has worked with the same guy. But if a sixteen year old with a great physique and mature mind comes along, I don't think he should be held back because of his age... This will likely happen like once in a century or something, but in that case, it would be pointless to limit his chances of entertaining us and get the money he deserves at that age.

But the fact remains that for every high school player who puts his game ahead of his education, there are thousands who fail and are left with few options for future careers. How many high schoolers are lucky enough to make the jump, attempt to make a pro team, and either aren't as good as they thought they were, or get injured and can't keep playing. Then what? They're left with the option of returning to college that they can't afford, and trying to find a career that doesn't exactly fit the lifestyle they expected.

And the fact that a lot of these kids come from bad neighbourhoods to begin with, the money is what drives them. When they fail, and they're left without an education and few options, waht they might return to is crime. Not because they're bad people, but its what they've grown up around, and see it as an opportunity to make some easy money and get them closer to the lifestyle they missed out on.

This is so true... Lots of people put their hopes and dreams in basket ball, rapping etc. But you have to remember that the environment from which they come from, there is likely no escape... Other than these lucky get rich things like rap and basket ball. Every kid in Brazil plays soccer and see it as the only way of getting out of the slums, which it almost is. They dream and hope that they get to become rich and don't have to dodge bullets any more in their regular lives... I think 50 cent's almbum title wraps this all up pretty nicely "get rich or die trying"... That is the mentality. One can always say that going to school and getting an education is a way out, but the fact is that the level of education can be very bad in some areas. There are teachers that just don't care and there are no books etc. so even if you do graduate from your school there is no guarrantee that you will succeed in college...

In college, I do believe that the players are demanded a certain grade point average to be allowed to represent the team in various sports. So you actually have know your stuff in college if you plan to play there. Some just can't do this... Like the often mentioned Jermain O'Neal... He might have been forgotten had he been forced to go to college. If he had a low GPA and he wasn't allowed to play on the team, who would have drafted him after that??? Absolutely no one... He would have been forgotten and he wouldn't play in the NBA today. No matter how good he was... He would have played in Europe and other places for years, before anyone from the NBA would have noticed...

School is good... Knowing stuff rocks... Getting a degree is important, but it doesn't take a degree to play ball... It doesn't take a degree to get to the NBA. There are players now have to go to a college and play there a year that couldn't care less about the studies and is widely known that they are going to drop out after a single year and go do professional sports after that... So I ask, what good is that? Education is good, but if you know when you are going in that you will be there for a year at maximum, then what good is that going to do you? You won't be motivated to get the education, you are there to kill the time before you sign up for the draft. This is what will inevitably follow...

I think this is unfair for the people that really do want an education... Now you have these great athletes that fill up some spots in a school and they do take the place of some other people, people who really would like to get an education and are going to finish the school and graduate and get their careers going. I would be pissed off, if I didn't get to go to a college I wanted to go and see all these athletes march in for their mandatory year! And especially pissed off, if I was the next in line to get in! If it was really close, but couldn't get in... That would really tick me off.

This was a bad ruling from the NBA head offices... Bad ruling...

I found that oden said something about this topic
see this in oden's site
http://www.gregoden.com/gregoden063006.php