Adam Silver makes massive announcement confirming NBA competition in Europe with FIBA

The NBA is already the leader in growing the game of basketball and commissioner Adam Silver is taking another step in this quest. The league initially played some of its pre-season games outside of North America before expanding that to hosting a few regular-season games.

Now, it appears Silver is ready to explore holding more games on a global scale by starting a new league in Europe. The commissioner is reportedly keen on exploring starting a new league as early as 2026, The Athletic reported on Wednesday.

Then, on the same day, Silver announced his plans to the media. And who better to do it with than with FIBA — the organization that governs basketball globally?

Silver made his announcement with FIBA's secretary general, Andreas Zagklis, that the NBA will begin exploring this idea.

"I'm particularly pleased today, along with my colleague Andreas, to announce that we are ready to go to the next stage," Silver said. "And that is to explore a potential league in Europe with FIBA as our partner."

Adam Silver's idea for a European League is still in the early stages. In fact, The Athletic's article quoted Silver as saying that nothing has been agreed upon yet and everything is pretty much still in the planning and talking phase.

However, it also states that this new European league already aims to get some of the already established European clubs to come play. The four teams that were mentioned were ASVEL Basketball, Barcelona, Fenerbahce Istanbul and Real Madrid.

There has been no mention of how this will affect the 30 teams in the NBA. The likelihood is that fans will get to see more games played between them and European clubs.

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Adam Silver admits the 2025 All-Star game was a flop

While he's thinking about expanding to a whole new league in Europe, Adam Silver is also thinking about how to improve the product that's already here. The NBA is also facing talks of expansion with new teams likely going to be added in the future.

Aside from expansions, Silver also needs to think about changing some of the things that are already around. One such thing is the All-Star game, which has received plenty of criticism with its recent iterations.

The commissioner himself acknowledged this by saying this year's game was not a hit.

"I thought we made almost an immeasurable amount of progress," Silver said. "I thought this was a little better, but it was a miss. We're not there in terms of creating an All-Star experience that we can be proud of and our players can be proud of."

The All-Star game was altered this year to have a different format. Four teams competed in short games through a single-elimination system. However, it faced criticisms, especially with how little basketball was actually played.

Another criticism that has plagued the All-Star game for years is the level of competitiveness. Some fans feel like the players do not compete as hard in it anymore which has taken away from the entertainment value.