From the time the Maharlika Pilipinas Basketball League (MPBL) crowned the San Juan Knights as the newest champion last April 25, 2019, the league is already making preparations for the upcoming season. The brand new edition of the MPBL will open on June 12, 2019. This gives the commissioner and its operations committee around two (2) months to prepare and make improvements from the past season.
Based from what we observed in the past season of the MPBL, we summarize some aspect of the league which needs improvement.
1. Better Streaming
The MPBL solely relied on Facebook for streaming live its games. True enough, Facebook is the biggest social media site and thus it makes sense to stream every MPBL game on it, but it is not necessarily the best live streaming platform.
The Official Facebook page of the MPBL was actually suspended twice by Facebook due to excessive use of bandwidth during its livestream. Since MPBL does not have a corporate account with Facebook, its bandwidth use is limited. The suspension of its offfical page is very unfortunate for the MPBL since at the time of its first suspension, the said Facebook page had around 350,000 likes. On the second suspension, the Facebook page had roughly 55,000 likes. Sadly, the first official page was never recovered.
This coming third season of the MPBL, its management should really give utmost priority in improving its livestream. Perhaps it can use Youtube as another livestreaming site because it offers a better and faster viewing experience. Furthermore, they must also ensure that they have enough bandwith or fast internet plan or connection to ensure a smooth and seamless livestream for the thousands of fans watching the games online.
2. Better social media and online presence
All the updates regarding the results of the games, schedules, and news or articles about the MPBL are posted and shared via its official Facebook Page. While the page is updated constantly with new articles, graphics, and photos, it is quite plain and boring because it only contains links to articles or a graphic of a game result or a player's statistics. Too bad it does not have video highlights of previous games or the top plays of the day, the week, or of the month. The MPBL should hire a dedicated team of social media manager that will churn out timely highlight reels that can be posted online to increase the social media engagement of MPBL's social media sites.
It would also be better for MPBL to create its own Youtube channel where it can post full length videos of games or curated highlights. Last season, the MPBL had a total of 365 games. If a video of each game was uploaded by MPBL on Youtube and each generated at least 100 thousand views, that's a total of 36.5 million views. Now assume Youtube will pay $1 per 1,000 views, MPBL can easily earn $36,500 per year or roughly P1.8 million.
There are already several fan sites that are uploading video highlights of MPBL games on Youtube. These independent sites are making money off MPBL videos without paying any license fees to MPBL. It's time for MPBL to assert its rights against those who infringe on its copyrights.
Moreover, MPBL is barely relevant in Twitter. Unlike the NBA or the PBA that tweetcast their play-by-play results coupled with short video clips on twitter, it seems MPBL totally ignored the twitterverse. There are still millions of Filipino twitter users. It would be great if MPBL tweetcast each and every score on a game and use a hash tag so that it will trend online. This way, more people will gain awarenes as to what MPBL is.
Lastly, MPBL should develop and host its own official website where it can upload all statistics of each team and players, game logs, individual player logs, MPBL records, news articles, videos, and the like. This way, it will be much easier to look for information that concerns the MPBL.
Currently, the website of the MPBL is hosted as a subdomain of webgeniussports. As a semi-professional league, it's thousand times better if MPBL will have its own domain such as www.mpbl.com provided it's still available. We hope it gets published before the third season begins.
3. Improve facilities
The MPBL copied the home-and-away format of the National Basketball Association (NBA). But unlike the established NBA which is the wealthiest basketball league in the world, the MPBL is just starting to build its foundation. Hence, it is quite understandable that the teams of the MPBL do not have stadiums that are as big or glitzy as those in the NBA.
Nonetheless, the MPBL should at least have a decent basic facilities for its games. The league must therefore ensure that the facilities where the basketball games are held should have broadcast-worthy venues.
First in the list is the lighting of the gyms or stadiums. There were arenas that have insufficient lighting which made the games played on it too dark to watch on Television. This is disappointing for many fans who are used to the standards of the NBA or the PBA. To remedy such problem, the MPBL must see to it that the homecourt of each team adheres to a certain illumination standards. This way, every game appears really good when broadcasted on tv.
Aside from lighting, the temperature inside the game venues leaves much to be desired. There are only few arenas such as the Filoil Flying V arena in San Juan that are air-conditioned. The rest are only cooled by heavy duty industrial fans which makes it uncomfortable not only for the fans but for players as well. It doesn't look good to see on national tv hordes of fans that use "pamaypays" to cool their selves.
Too much sweat dripping from players affects the quality of the game too since the drops of sweat makes the court too slippery which is unsafe for all the players. It also leads to so many turnovers as the ball easily slips from their hands. Ultimately, the game becomes ugly because players will try to avoid playing aggressively to avoid injuries.
In addition, the rings in Every venue should be replaced with brand new ones. It is an eyesore to see rusty rings on tv. Worse, a game in Navotas was suspended due to a broken ring. That was actually embarrassing for a semi-professional league especially since the game was broadcasted live on tv.
It would also be much better for the league if teams will put their logos in the middle of the court. Valenzuela and Bacoor are good examples since these teams emblazoned their cool logos mid court. They really look good on tv.
Lastly, the MPBL should be strict in admitting teams that do not have their own broadcast-worthy arenas. Mandaluyong initially played their games in the gym of the Jose Rizal University Bombers which is just big enough as a practice gym. When they realized that they deserve a bigger court, they transferred their games to the ynares sports arena in Pasig. It's actually mind boggling for a highly urbanized city such as Mandaluyong to have no decent sports arena. It speaks of their priority and it seems basketball or sports in general is not one of them. In fact, Basilan has a better basketball arena. Hopefully the upcoming Mayor of Mandaluyong gives attention to sports development. Otherwise, it makes sense to just sell the franchise of Mandaluyong to other cities that deserve more an MPBL team.
4. Standardize Ticket Prices
Currently, the MPBL leaves it to the teams to set the prices of the tickets to their home games. Some teams charge admission fees while some don't. Evidently, such setup is working since most of homes games are jampacked.
But their is a downside if tickets are given at a very low price or for free. Some undisciplined fans are able to enter the stadium and watched the games. As seen during the finals, some disgruntled home fans threw water bottles at the court if they don't agree with the calls of the referees or if their team is losing. That is actually a security concern since it may lead to a full blown riot that will endanger the safety of the fans and players.
To remedy such problem, the MPBL should standardize tickets across all venues at a price affordable enough to fill up the venues but expensive enough to discourage the jeje crowds. The additional revenue from ticket sales will truly help each team defray their operations expenses. In return, this will ensure the longevity of the league and hopefully it will not suffer the same fate as the defunct Metropolitan Basketball Association (MBA).
5. Shorten the season
The MPBL is definitely considering shortening the MPBL season. The Datu Cup lasted for 10 months which is even longer than an NBA season. At such length, the league is too taxing for the players who risk being injured and also too expensive for team owners who will have to pay a lot of overhead expenses.
An 8-month season similar to the NBA should be ideal. This will give teams enough time to retool their roster after the season ends. Moreover, players will surely love to have plenty of rest for four (4) months.
In order to shorten the season, the MPBL should increase game days to seven (7) times a week so that each squad will have at least one game a week. This will make it more exciting for fans since they will get to see their favorite teams play more often.
In summary, the previous seasons of the MPBL were not perfect. There are definitely bumps along the way but the league is still young. There are still more rooms for improvement but we are glad that the league is moving into the right direction.
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