BJ-League Commissioner Toshimitsu Kawachi said that
the organizing committee for a "unified professional basketball league in
Japan has discussed things 'constructively,'" according to Kaz Nagatsuka of the JAPAN TIMES. He also said, "We don't know what’s going to happen." It sounds like the future is "still cloudy." But one thing is
"for sure: The clock is ticking and the FIBA-imposed deadline is still
Oct. 31." The Japan Basketball Association is "facing a ban from FIBA"
for int'l activities, so it is "working to resolve one of the
major issues that basketball's world governing body has demanded that it
must fix: a merger between its basketball leagues." The JBA "must at least show
FIBA that it is going to start a new professional league" by combining
the NBL and BJ-League. It seems like the "biggest challenge" would be how to "persuade the corporate-owned NBL teams to become
full-fledged professional clubs." Based on the merger blueprint that the organizing committee
has turned in, all the teams are "asked to have managing companies, whose
main business is basketball." So the NBL's "company teams, such as
Toyota, Aisin and Toshiba, would be required to create subsidiary
companies for basketball operations in the new league" (JAPAN TIMES, 10/8).
