{"id":81303,"date":"2019-08-07T15:10:02","date_gmt":"2019-08-07T20:10:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?p=81303"},"modified":"2019-08-07T15:10:02","modified_gmt":"2019-08-07T20:10:02","slug":"tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/","title":{"rendered":"TBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Neel Madhavan<\/strong>
\nMedill Reports<\/em><\/p>\n

The roots of the The Basketball Tournament can be traced back to a group text message thread from a Sunday afternoon in 2010 between some like-minded friends.<\/p>\n

On their day off from work, TBT CEO and co-founder Jon Mugar and his friends went back-and-forth about the feasibility of having an open call for a single elimination tournament for a large sum of money.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho would enter?\u201d Mugar asked. \u201cWould LeBron put a team in? Would the NBA players play? Would college alumni teams play? Would international players play? It kind of became an obsession over the course of maybe four or five months.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Mugar, who worked as a writer and producer for sketch comedy shows on IFC, Comedy Central and HBO prior to TBT, admits the idea seemed a little far-fetched at first, but he remained persistent. He would go to a coffee shop some days and work on a document pitching the idea of the tournament, and then he\u2019d send it around to people in the industry looking for feedback.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe pitched it for like two years and no one would do it cause they all loved the idea but, who are we to pull it off?\u201d Mugar said.<\/p>\n

In 2014, Mugar and the initial core TBT team decided to use the feedback they received and raise the money themselves to put on a 32-team tournament in Philadelphia for $500,000.<\/p>\n

TBT has grown in all kinds of measurable ways since its inception in 2014, including being nationally televised on ESPN to the prize money for the winning team increasing to $2 million. But, according to the guys who participate in the tournament, the biggest way it has grown is the talent and caliber of player that it draws on an annual basis.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe players that are playing this year are some of the best in the world,\u201d said Carmen\u2019s Crew and former Ohio State guard Aaron Craft. \u201cSo, a lot of guys are wanting to take a chance at the opportunity to win some money. I know when you get better players, you get better games, and you get better games, you get more fans to watch.”<\/p>\n

<\/a>
Overseas Elite’s Jeremy Pargo (left) brings the ball up the court against Carmen’s Crew’s Aaron Craft (right) in the semifinals of The Basketball Tournament at Wintrust Arena on Aug. 4, 2019.(Neel Madhavan\/MEDILL)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Overseas Elite and former St. John\u2019s small forward D.J. Kennedy feels the same way. This was his fifth year playing in TBT and having been a part of an Overseas Elite team that has won the tournament four years in a row, he\u2019s seen the rise in the talent level first-hand over the years.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a lot more competitive,\u201d Kennedy said. \u201cEvery year it gets tougher, that\u2019s why I feel like this year it\u2019s been toughest for us, talent-wise because there\u2019s more talent than ever. Each year you\u2019re going to see more pros and top-level players that want to join.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Mugar, he says the goal is for TBT to grow to the point where it\u2019s on the level of March Madness and the NCAA tournament.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe feel like we can own basketball for four weeks of the year, and we feel like we’re pretty close already,\u201d Mugar said. \u201cRight after [NBA] Summer League ends we come on and we’re the show for three-and-a-half to four weeks. So, we want to keep amplifying that and growing it, and just getting in front of more and more fans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Photo at top: Team Hines’ Mike James (left) drives into the paint against Brotherly Love’s Frantz Massenat (right) in the quarterfinals of The Basketball Tournament at Wintrust Arena on Aug. 2, 2019. (Neel Madhavan\/MEDILL)<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Neel Madhavan Medill Reports The roots of the The Basketball Tournament can be traced back to a group text message thread from a Sunday afternoon in 2010 between some like-minded friends. On their day off from work, TBT CEO and co-founder Jon Mugar and his friends went back-and-forth about the feasibility of having an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":531,"featured_media":81309,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4779],"tags":[4585,1190,4783,4784],"class_list":["post-81303","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-summer-2019","tag-college-basketball","tag-nba","tag-tbt","tag-the-basketball-tournament"],"yoast_head":"\nTBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever - Medill Reports Chicago<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"TBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever - Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Neel Madhavan Medill Reports The roots of the The Basketball Tournament can be traced back to a group text message thread from a Sunday afternoon in 2010 between some like-minded friends. On their day off from work, TBT CEO and co-founder Jon Mugar and his friends went back-and-forth about the feasibility of having an […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2019-08-07T20:10:02+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/08\/MikeJamesTBT.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1100\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"733\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"neelmadhavan2019\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"neelmadhavan2019\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/\",\"name\":\"TBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever - Medill Reports Chicago\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/08\/MikeJamesTBT.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2019-08-07T20:10:02+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/2e6c78dd922092cc92c277a08c23c142\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/08\/MikeJamesTBT.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/08\/MikeJamesTBT.jpg\",\"width\":1100,\"height\":733,\"caption\":\"Team Hines' Mike James (left) drives into the paint against Brotherly Love's Frantz Massenat (right) in the quarterfinals of The Basketball Tournament at Wintrust Arena on Aug. 2, 2019.\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"TBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/\",\"name\":\"Medill Reports Chicago\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/2e6c78dd922092cc92c277a08c23c142\",\"name\":\"neelmadhavan2019\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/06aa1a12d48c40fe1b01517d31b00e7d55d2c715ebaf59622f6ccddc1cc69ca4?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/06aa1a12d48c40fe1b01517d31b00e7d55d2c715ebaf59622f6ccddc1cc69ca4?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"neelmadhavan2019\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/author\/neelmadhavan2019\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"TBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever - Medill Reports Chicago","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"TBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever - Medill Reports Chicago","og_description":"By Neel Madhavan Medill Reports The roots of the The Basketball Tournament can be traced back to a group text message thread from a Sunday afternoon in 2010 between some like-minded friends. On their day off from work, TBT CEO and co-founder Jon Mugar and his friends went back-and-forth about the feasibility of having an […]","og_url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/","og_site_name":"Medill Reports Chicago","article_published_time":"2019-08-07T20:10:02+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1100,"height":733,"url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/08\/MikeJamesTBT.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"neelmadhavan2019","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"neelmadhavan2019","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/","url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/","name":"TBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever - Medill Reports Chicago","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/08\/MikeJamesTBT.jpg","datePublished":"2019-08-07T20:10:02+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/2e6c78dd922092cc92c277a08c23c142"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/08\/MikeJamesTBT.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/medill.wordpress.offload\/WP%20Media%20Folder%20-%20medill-reports-chicago\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2019\/08\/MikeJamesTBT.jpg","width":1100,"height":733,"caption":"Team Hines' Mike James (left) drives into the paint against Brotherly Love's Frantz Massenat (right) in the quarterfinals of The Basketball Tournament at Wintrust Arena on Aug. 2, 2019."},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/tbt-poised-for-continued-growth-with-player-caliber-higher-than-ever\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"TBT poised for continued growth with player-caliber higher than ever"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#website","url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/","name":"Medill Reports Chicago","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/2e6c78dd922092cc92c277a08c23c142","name":"neelmadhavan2019","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/06aa1a12d48c40fe1b01517d31b00e7d55d2c715ebaf59622f6ccddc1cc69ca4?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/06aa1a12d48c40fe1b01517d31b00e7d55d2c715ebaf59622f6ccddc1cc69ca4?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"neelmadhavan2019"},"url":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/author\/neelmadhavan2019\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/531"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81303\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81309"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}