A Cleveland-based basketball league that aims to turn the NCAA model on its proverbial head has added a two-time NBA All-Star to its list of top executives.

David West — who played 15 NBA seasons, including the last two with the champion Golden State Warriors — was announced this week as the chief operating officer of the Historical Basketball League. The league plans to launch in 2020, and says it will pay college players between $50,000 and $150,000 per season, "based on athletic talent and marketability." The players will also be guaranteed a scholarship, the HBL says, and will get the chance to sign with an agent — a move that would make them ineligible by NCAA standards.

Ricky Volante, an attorney in the sports, entertainment and media practice group of Cleveland-based Buckley King LPA, is one of the HBL's co-founders. The other is Andy Schwarz, a Bay Area economist. Schwarz, West and other members of the leadership team operate out of Silicon Valley.

The VC-backed league has identified 20 potential regions, from which it will pick 12 and look for team operators. Cleveland, according to league spokesman Chris Miller, is on the short list of cities and likely will be home to an HBL team. An official announcement will come at a later date, Miller said.

The teams will play games in the summer, which the HBL said will "minimize interference with the academic calendar." In addition to Cleveland/Akron, the other nine possibilities for what is expected to be a six-team Eastern Conference are Atlanta; Baltimore/Washington, D.C.; Boston; Brooklyn; Charlotte; Detroit; Jacksonville/Miami; Pittsburgh/Philadelphia; and Richmond, Va. (You can read the entire list here.)

The league is meeting with potential team operators, who will have some influence on the cities that are selected, Miller said.

West — an Xavier University product who played for the New Orleans/Oklahoma City Hornets, Indiana Pacers, San Antonio Spurs and Warriors — will oversee recruiting, scouting, player performance and NBA relations. The 38-year-old West, an HBL news release stated, "will help form true and transparent partnerships with the HBL's players."

College athletes, the league says, "are the heart of their sport and deserve a fair share of the revenues they generate."

The HBL will have some competition in its efforts to recruit basketball prospects who are looking to bypass the NCAA before, ideally, entering the NBA. In October, the G League, the NBA's development circuit, announced that it will, starting with the 2019-20 season, offer "select contracts" worth $125,000 to elite prospects who aren't yet eligible for the NBA.

In a letter posted on the HBL's website, Volante said the G League's move "solidifies the 'compensation or education' way of thinking.

"The HBL," he added, "is focused on ending this false choice by providing compensation AND education. With that in mind, we decided to raise our maximum salary to $150,000 per season, plus the benefits that will be provided, as well as additional bonuses that may be offered."

The league's goal: "To be the premier opportunity for college basketball players."

Doing so could be difficult, because of the clout of the NCAA — despite all of its flaws — and because of the new G League initiative, which will be pushed by the NBA.

But the HBL appears to have some significant backing, and now it has West as one of its faces.

"I want to be on the right side of history — it's that simple," the former power forward said in a statement announcing his HBL hire. "These guys playing with passion and for the love of the game is true, but they also deserve an opportunity to share in the profits they help generate."

On that, most of us seem to agree.

How to make it work is an issue the HBL and quite a few others are trying to solve.

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