Remember all the trouble the NBA had with the composite ball? Well, the league recently decided to halt the program altogether, so for the time being (at least), they’re going with leather.
“We are committed to leather for the foreseeable future,” said league spokesman Tim Frank. “We just realized leather is what our guys wanted.”
Most college and high school conferences, as well as some foreign and international leagues, use balls made of synthetic material because they’re less expensive to produce and provide more consistency from ball to ball.
The NBA introduced a composite ball at the start of the 2006-07 season, but after complaints from players that the balls became slick from perspiration and left tiny cuts on their fingertips, the league returned to leather in January 2007.
The league hoped to develop a composite ball that met its players’ approval, and to that end, according to sources, experimented with three different types of composite balls in the
D-League last season.It also formed a committee of top NBA players to test the new versions and offer their input, something that was not done the first time.
The production cost for Spalding, the company that makes the league’s official ball, was one reason the league looked to switch to a composite material. The plan now is to develop a two-paneled ball, rather than the current eight-panel model.
The two-panel design was used on the composite ball and did not raise any complaints. Spalding is supposedly hoping that the feature can be used as a marketing tool.
After the league introduced the microfiber ball, I played with it in one of my rec leagues and didn’t really like it. It just didn’t have a good feel to it, which outweighs the benefit of having more consistency game to game. After forcing the ball down the players’ throats two seasons ago, this is the right move by the NBA…even though it’s not going to make cows very happy.
