Australian Basketball's Rebirth | Thebigtip

An amazing thing happened in sport this week, and it revolved around passion, not money. No, we are not talking about AFL and Ross Lyon or Tom Scully, nor are we talking about Harry Kewell. The names we need to pin on the board today are Patty Mills and Andrew Bogut.

As the NBA season continues to show no signs of breaking free of being locked out, the by-product of this situation has been the NBL getting a lick of paint. NBA players are looking for other leagues to play in whilst the NBA men in suits continue their arm wrestles, and this has led to Patty Mills signing up for the Melbourne Tigers, and Andrew Bogut rumoured to be on the verge of joining Mills in the NBL. Rumour or not, Bogut, along with Mills, has played a vital role in getting basketball fans in Australia talking about the NBL, giving the fledgling league a real shot in the arm.

It would be easy for Bogut and Mills to go and play in Europe during the lockout, to get more money, and play at a higher standard. What’s stopping them is passion, an enthusiasm for lifting the profile of basketball in Australia.

Patty Mills and Andrew Bogut are perhaps the best Australian sporting personalities (if not in the world) at interacting with their fans on Twitter. Mills regularly holds Australian trivia quizzes with his Portland fans on Twitter, and Bogut also often trades conversation with the average Joe on Twitter. They are the human side of sport. This week their mission was to get the NBL trending on Twitter, and they succeeded. Today Mills is trying to ignite the passion for the Melbourne Tigers by championing new slogans suck as ‘Melbourne Tigers Ambush Army’. Mills and Bogut are achieving something NBL marketing executives have been failing at for years, getting people talking about basketball in Australia again.

The NBL has been asleep for a number of years now, following its heady days of the late nineties. Back then there were genuine stars such as Chris Anstey, Andrew Gaze, Shane Heal, Andrew Vlahov, Leroy Loggins and Lanard Copeland to name a few. These were household names in basketball, and sports fans were able to identify with them, and as such with the NBL.

NBL suddenly went invisible from the public, no longer available on free-to-air television, with popular clubs folding, and a raft of favourite stars either retiring or moving on overseas. Suddenly fans had nothing to identify with, and the loss of fan money forced clubs to play in smaller stadiums, in turn losing atmosphere at games. The NBL has been in dire straights for quite some time, but it seems that the NBA’s problems may translate to the NBL’s gain?

Patty Mills and Andrew Bogut will bring the NBL back to its feet. Already surveying fans about ways the NBL can increase its exposure and reputation amongst fans on Twitter, they have already put the NBL years ahead of where it might have been. Now the final step is to see these two players on an NBL court, filling every seat with an enthusiastic basketball fan, and if the response from Twitter is anything to go by, we can expect just that!

We can only hope the NBL is listening and watching the interactions between Mills, Bogut and the thousands of voices on Twitter. There is a genuine passion there to revive Hoops in Australia, and the NBL need to tap into this if they are to return to the glory days of the nineties.

Patty Mills and Andrew Bogut, hold your heads up high. It is refreshing to have sporting personalities who actually care about the game, and not primarily about their wallets. The fact you are willing to play in the NBL for practically nothing is testament to this. Let’s hope Mills and Bogut’s efforts are rewarded with a renewed passion toward grass roots basketball from Australians, as this unique opportunity to have home grown talent playing in Australia - in their prime - may not come again.