3. August 1949. Year Birth of the NBA!

There were two of them at first. We don’t know, already the birth of the NBA, The 3. August 1949. years, Is the fetus of joining between two already existing leagues at the time: National Basketball League (NBL) created in 1937. years, and the Baa Basketball Association (BAA) in 1946. years. Two rival leagues, that seat.

« Conference 1. July (1949) in Chicago, between the two rival leagues failed to calm professional basketball with refusing to merge », Reporte United Press evoking ” Guerre Between two entities, three years.

How did we get there? Over the decade before. When the “Medium Basketball Conference”, which can be considered “Grandma” of the NBA, was born in 1935. years. In his beginnings, this league gathers a little less than a dozen teams, mostly business teams.

In 1937 she changed her name with the aim of attracting a wide audience and became a “national basketball league”. The latter is established in the “small” industrial cities of the Great Lake States (Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio …). After ten years of existence, and once the World War I ended, NBL sees his first star, certain George Mika.

When the hockey sample is turned on …

At the same time, 1946. years, less good news was announced: the birth of a competitive league, “basketball associations of America”. She has ” Mostly launched hockey team owners who wanted to fill their rooms at a matchless night “, describes the New York Times. “The league had less talented players than NBL, but the advantage of playing in big cities like New York, Philadelphia and Boston. His first head of Maurice Podoloff, is also the president of the American Hockey League.

The turnaround happened in 1948. year, when Minneapolis Lakers and their star George Mikan, migrated from NBL to Baa. With the possibility of performing larger scenes, where the NBL could attract only 2,000 people the most. BAA, whose first competitors seasons were built History of the NBA (Unlike NBL), it is located in the position of power to absorb or at least connect with NBL.

« Connect – even complicated with 19 teams, total two league number – would make professional basketball better investment “, Judge Indianapolis NewsIn late July 1949. “Two leagues acknowledged that they lost their income. “An agreement must be achieved, otherwise” The two leagues will be destroyed “People even Ika Duffei, President NBL.

1. August 1949. years, Sheboygan Press Publish 14 ingredient spots of merging. The first of them concerns league name: it will be the “national basketball association”. This Charter also provides for the creation of four departments: two divisions of five teams for clubs of the future former Baa, two more than four teams for those NBL. 3. August two parties are in Baa offices at the end of the Empire State Building Empire.

The connection works, the NBA was born.

The article was initially published in 2019 years