If there is a single team in the NBA that stands as a testament to the value of the NBA G League, it well might be the Miami Heat. Nearly half the roster has spent time with the Sioux Falls Skyforce, with two-way players Duncan Robinson and Yante Maten about to head there.
And yet, when it came to this past week's announcement that the G League next year will begin a program next season that will offer five-month $125,000 Select Contracts to 18-year-old prep prospects who prefer to bypass college, Rodney McGruder said it could be a case of being careful of what the G League and the potential pioneering players wish for.
"It'll be a great learning experience," said McGruder, whose road to the NBA included time with the Maine Red Claws and Skyforce. "But the players there are going to attack them. They're going to attack them for sure."
Not physically, mind you (although McGruder smiled at that suggestion), but rather with the hunger of all G League players who toil for $35,000 salaries with eyes on the NBA million-dollar prize.
"It's not a selfish league." McGruder said. "But everyone is also playing for themselves."
That makes the plan both promising and flawed.
First, it is about time the NBA offers some type of escape from the NCAA recruiting sleaze. And a college player who is one-semester-and-done hardly is a collegian at all.
But injecting 18-year-olds into a G League mix without a defined NBA affiliation (they would not be draft eligible until after their G League Select season) creates its own conundrums.
Foremost, what would be the incentive of developing a prospect under an NBA team's umbrella in the G League when that player will then be drafted away by another franchise?
That doesn't mean there isn't value in the approach, of a gradual easing into the professional realm.
The G League is saying all the right things, offering all the correct catchphrases. There will be "robust programmatic opportunities for development," "supporting infrastructure," "basketball and life skills developmental tools," "academic scholarship."
And that is a pragmatic start. As G League President Malcolm Turner put it, "Select Contracts are an answer to the basketball community's call for additional development options for elite players before they are eligible for the NBA."
While the program, itself, won't be one-and-done, with the NBA not expected to lower the age limit to 18 until the 2022 draft at the earliest, it nonetheless could be short-lived.
But in the interim, there also might be a better way.
Instead of integrating G League Select players into the team pool already in place, perhaps a better option is a G League Select team of its own, similar to how the D League used to field its own team during the NBA Summer League.
Such an approach would allow players to spend time with like-minded players, while also beginning to experience the professional lifestyle. Such a team could also serve as the basis for teams utilized for World Cup qualifying, similar to the teams of G League players that Jeff Van Gundy has been coaching over the past year.
A G League Select team also could then hire a truly developmental coach, one with a focus on preparing players for the next level. In fact, it would be a perfect place for former college coaches who either ran afoul or tired of the college game. Did anyone say Rick Pitino?
Beyond that, upgraded training facilities for such developing players would be essential, similar to ones on college campus. Charter travel also would closer replicate the college apparatus. While such approaches would delineate such players from the typical NBA experience, isn't that what $125,000 vs. $35,000 does anyway?
The one thing the NBA has done particularly well in recent seasons has been adapting its resources, be it the NBA Replay Center or the advent of two-way contracts.
For his part, McGruder said he would not have traded his time at Kansas State for an early six-figure paycheck.
"The college experience is great," he said. "You can ask anybody in the world who experiences college, they'll tell you it was the most fun time of their life, even if you just go for a year.
"Who says you go to the G League and have a mediocre experience for a year and it decreases your stock? So those are the things you've got to take into consideration, as well."
To McGruder, it could come down to: coddled or cash.
"The top guys, they're going to be targeted whether it's in college or the G League," he said. "But you know they're going to be targeted by the G League guys. That's how it is. There is a different hunger there."
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