The authorised governing body of professional men’s basketball league, National Basketball Association is one among the four major North American professional sports league. Popularly known as NBA, this league comprises of thirty teams, twennty nine in the USA and one in canada. Being an active member of USA Basketball (USAB), it also has got the recognition from the International Basketball Federation. Found in New York City on June 6, 1946 as Basketball Association of America (BAA), the league was rechristianed as National Basketball Association in 1949 after its merger with the rival National Basketball League. The major offices of the Association is suituated in the Olympic Tower in New York City.

The first match of the NBA, then known as BAA, was on November 1, 1946, in Toronto. It got merged with NBL in 1949 and in 1950 got consolidated to eleven franchises. NBA faced a big external threat in the 1960’s with the formation of Ameraican Basketball Association (ABA), which hijacked many big shraks from NBA. But NBA survived the threats and moved ahead in a faster pace. NBAfprmed an affiliated minor league, the National Basketball Development League, which is now called as NBA Development League.

NBA introduced a new offical game ball on June 29, 2006, the fist change of the ball in over 35 years. But there were compalints from various corners as many players felt it too slippery when wet and too sticky when dry. NBA later decided to withdraw the new ball following the suit filed by the Player’s Association. The NBA jerseys come from Addidas, which purchased the Reebok, the previous supplier. NBA was formed with 11 teams, but currently comprises of 30 teams, which are divided into two conferences of three divisions with five teams each.

NBA generally holds the training camps for teams in October, in which, the teams are free to assign players with less than two years of experience. A regular session of NBA usually kicks off in the first week of November.

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