It's a travesty Jick.

$$$ would be my guess.

Jick...you seem un-naturally enamoured with Cam. The use of highly emotive language doesn't help.

Any team that doesn't sign him is insane. Any team that lets him go has a bad culture.

So 9 teams have no clue but only you know the truth?

His 11.8ppg ranks behind Jordair Jett and Jacob Wiley. This disproves the 'score all day' assertion.

You'll probably then point me to his 11.8ppg was done in 21 mpg. Do you want to pay top dollar for a 21mpg player?

Nonetheless, Cam is a good player that would be an asset to any team. But there must be a reason why he is unsigned.

7 local vacancies remaining.
Cairns have 2 (1 if Jawai is signed)
Melbourne 1 spot.
NZL 2 spots.
Perth 2 spots.
Based on assumption all teams going with three imports.

Unless he goes to NZ or Perth take him as 6th man I don't see him in NBL next year.

He made it know he was pursuing opportunities in Europe didn't he?

Brisbane weren’t going to renew him at franchise player wages for what he contributed. Depends on his flexibility in terms of dollars.

Is he 100% healthy?

Definitely wants more $$$ than any club wants to risk paying him in case he breaks down.

Sounds like they think he doesn't run the floor to their standards which is sad as I'd love to see him play in Perth (instead of Wagstaff) but do you really want to pay top dollar for someone waiting for Nick Kay to tire before he gets some court time?

Give it a rest, its a good question.
He's a very good player and would be an asset to any team. Particularly when good aussies are so hard to come by. I think that he and Jawai fall into an unfortunate category - they are not good enough to take a starter's place (Cam due to his injury worries) but they are too good and too expensive to be bench players.
Perhaps he could end up at Sydney - they see to be able to make up their own rules.

"7 local vacancies remaining."

How many of those vacancies also could be used for imports under the Next Stars or Asian player exceptions?

Teams can sign next stars over and above the 7 remaining spots.

If teams can now sign NBA 2nd round stashes as next stars AND the NBL pays for them then there are no longer spots for locals.

I agree....go back to 48 mins.

More basketball more minutes for these players to prove themselves.

People are seriously concerned about locals being squeezed out of the league?

Adam Doyle, Brendan Teys, Rhys Vague, Greg Hire, Mitch Young, Will Magnay, Deng Acouth, Dane Pineau, Kevin White, Marshall Nelson, Dan Trist, Majok Majok, Jordan Ngatai were all on NBL rosters last season folks.

Zodiac, if you add Cam, Nate, 3 imports, 1 x Next Star and 1 x draft & stash to that list and there's our next team.

Based in ACT as the Canberra Coalition of Castoffs.

It's hard to say without knowing why he was restricted to only 21mpg. But the simple answer is that no team is going to pay a starter's salary for somebody that can only manage 21 minutes.
For the money he'd be asking he'd be a tight squeeze to get into the bench cap, which means he needs to find a team that wants a 4/5 as their 6th man.
I imagine his agent is also shopping him hard around Europe for next season, so he probably won't drop his price unless he gets no interest over there.

As for local places, its all about getting the balance right, and I think the league is ok. Having access to Next Stars probably helps some locals. It means you can have a guy on the end of the bench that you're still developing and hope will improve across the season, or alternatively keep a veteran for one last hurrah.

Briiiiinnnng back 48 minute games!

Zodiac - there's an interesting thing going on with local/foreign split in NBL. Some of the fringe players you list are probably getting time in the NBL because so may Australian professionals are now plying their trade overseas. Back in the 1990s, those players were playing NBL and the odd few of them got an overseas contract that took them out of the NBL.

The number of top and next tier Australian pros playing overseas has removed a layer of local talent from the NBL. By default, NBL's gradual removal of import restrictions has replaced that lost talent with foreign players.

The other thing that seems to have happened is that most young locals seem now to use college as the pathway for their preparation for professional basketball rather than the NBL. Kind of ironic that NBL used to be seen as a development pathway for local players but now it's now being promoted as one for USA players!

This is not intended to be critical at all. NBL is a business that needs to focus on the bottom line, rather than parochialism. I simply find the way things have evolved pretty interesting. It's also not just about NBL, it's also about the globalisation of professional sport. NBL has to compete in a much bigger marketplace than it did even 15 years ago.

I kind of don't buy the argument that imports are making it so much harder for Aussies. I mean, you have some absolute garbage players at the bottom of NBL benches who have no real business picking up a pay cheque to play basketball, and as long as that is a fact I won't buy that the NBL doesn't have enough spots for developing Australian talent. Brendan Teys is taking a spot. Why blame an import for his spot when there's an Aussie there whose already reached his underwhelming ceiling?

As for salary cap restrictions, maybe that could be seen as the issue that needs to be fixed to allow for a Bairstow to be a sixth man. But this league is not what it is without imports. The imports raise the standard that the Australians have to play at. As the league grows I'd actually want import quotas to rise to meet it or you're going to have someone like Kevin White in the starting back court of the next NBL team or something.

It seems to me the formula for a successful NBL team is -

Two stud imports
One very good role playing import
Two Boomers level players
Two to three adequate role players
Two to three shit kickers who are just vaguely good enough for the rest to practice against in training and/or developing Australians who may actually find themselves in the prior group with time.

And then maybe your team adds a Next Star. I don't see an issue with this at all.

"As for salary cap restrictions, maybe that could be seen as the issue that needs to be fixed to allow for a Bairstow to be a sixth man."

The cap applies to the 5 lowest paid, hence you can have 6 players who aren't capped (and subject only to the tax.) So notionally you'd have 5 Starters and a "6th Man."
So salarywise Bairstow could be a 6th Man. It's just a matter of finding a team that wants to use that 6th-man salary slot on a 4/5 who's good for 21mpg.

It could be that a team like the Wildcats is waiting to see who their import Centre is, before talking to guys like Jawai or Bairstow???

So because Brisbane didn't re-sign him, they are at fault?

If you bothered to read Liam's interview with Richard Clarke, they want to run more. Bairstow is more of a half-court player. So they didn't re-sign him. Happens all the time in sport.

And the Bullets also helped him with his rehab, so they can't be too bad!

Lay off the weed.

"Zodiac - there's an interesting thing going on with local/foreign split in NBL. Some of the fringe players you list are probably getting time in the NBL because so may Australian professionals are now plying their trade overseas. Back in the 1990s, those players were playing NBL and the odd few of them got an overseas contract that took them out of the NBL."


For much of the 1990s there were around twice as many Aussies in the league as there are now. In reality there are probably around 20 Aussies playing pro ball overseas who would definitely get an NBL gig, and around 60 Aussies in the NBL.

It's probably never been harder to get a job as a professional basketballer at the time when we've got the most talent. In the mid 90s there were something like 30 players 21 and under in the NBL, now there is a handful , and most players returning from college can't get an NBL roster spot at 22 or 23.