OPINION

By Mike DeCourcy

updated 7:28 p.m. ET June 14, 2009

Mike DeCourcy

The scandals surrounding the matriculation of superstar guards O.J. Mayo and Derrick Rose have led to a vast chorus of columnists, bloggers and even a United States representative suggesting the best available solution is for the NBA to repeal its draft age minimum.

Some of you might find it a bit disconcerting that a congressman, Steve Cohen of Tennessee, would squander the weight of his office on such a frivolous matter.

I'm more bothered that someone could be so misguided on the issue and yet talk so loudly about it.

The current ills of college basketball are connected to the 19-year-age minimum in the way the swine flu outbreak is related to the handshake. This practice may spread the disease, but that does not mean we should abandon such a worthwhile custom.

"As far as realizing full potential, it's the college game that does it — for even the prodigy players," said ESPN basketball analyst Len Elmore, who played 10 years in the NBA after completing a stellar career at Maryland. "You can make a point about Kobe and Dwight Howard not going to college and what they've been able to do — but I look at Dwight Howard in particular and, as good as he is, he could probably be better. He's not nearly as proficient at demanding the ball, establishing position, as he needs to be as a big man.

"The same can be said about LeBron, who's probably the best athlete in the world. His footwork — he's off-balance, he's got a lot of problems in the midrange. That's probably nit-picking, but he could be better."

Slideshow   NBA draft: The top prospects A look at the top players available in the 2009 NBA draft. more photos

Business considerations led NBA commissioner David Stern to propose a draft age minimum earlier this decade. The popularity of his league had waned as a large segment of basketball fans — college fans — became disconnected from the highest-profile players. Perhaps even more alarming was the overwhelming failure rate of America's most promising prospects. Players with the ability to become NBA regulars were washing out (Ndudi Ebi, Robert Swift). Players with star potential were becoming role players (Kendrick Perkins, Kwame Brown).

Given the talent level of players following the preps-to-pros course, they were flopping, on some level, at a rate of greater than 50 percent.

Armed with a decade's worth of evidence, Stern determined an age minimum of 20 years would allow players who entered the draft to be, in most cases, more mature, better trained and better marketed. However, agents concerned their investments in teenage prospects might spoil as players spent two years in college began pushing for the players' association to resist. So 19 years and a year out of high school — the "one-and-done rule" — became the compromise.

The age minimum is a negotiated work rule, same as the draft and the rookie salary scale. Which is why Elmore, an attorney with a Harvard law degree, believes it is ludicrous for age-minimum opponents to contend the league is interfering with the "rights" of teenaged players to pursue a living.

"Since when is it a right to play for the NBA? That, to me, is a privilege," Elmore said. "They choose you. You don't choose them."

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