The main reason is of course the war and its peripheral consequences, with the first and most significant derivative from Maccabi’s point of view being the sale of subscriptions. A large part of the budget, as we know, is based on subscriptions and tickets, but in light of the fact that no one – in the Euroleague or within Maccabi Tel Aviv – can determine with certainty where the team’s home games will be held next season, before the sale of subscriptions has begun.
As soon as subscriptions go on sale, business will start to move a little faster, but the Maccabi management is also trying to find the formula to market the subscriptions to the fans, given the uncertainty regarding Yad Eliyahu hosting next season. One of the options on the agenda is to start at a certain stage (which has not yet been definitively determined) the sale of subscriptions, with a fixed/pre-agreed outline of compensation, for each game, if and when it will not be possible to host in the hall. It is possible that the same compensations, by the way, will be spread over several future seasons, as Maccabi did in the outline of the current season.
The management is supposed to meet in the coming days and make a decision regarding subscriptions, which will of course directly affect the budget – to allow the professional manager Avi Even to start operating in the market regarding the next season. Because so far, due to the financial problem, Maccabi has not made an offer to any player who does not have a contract for next season. Most of the senior players on the roster (Lorenzo Brown, Wade Baldwin, Bonzie Colson, Roman Sorkin, Tamir Blatt, John DiBartholomeo) do have a guaranteed contract, for some the team has an option (Hasiel Rivero, James Webb, Antonios Cleveland), but There are those who have finished contracts – Josh Niebo, let’s say.
Maccabi Tel Aviv would very much like to keep the center, who has become one of the best in Europe this season in his role. In light of his progress, he received several extremely high financial offers from Euroleague teams and will likely sign with Milan. Maccabi Tel Aviv made an offer to him within its capabilities, but it also knew that it would be very difficult for it to compete with the alternatives that were placed before it. Even in normal seasons, it should be noted, Maccabi would have had difficulty keeping Nivo, who is supposed to double his salary in Milan, but in light of the uncertainty surrounding the The budget for next season, this season – it was really hopeless.
The only person with whom financial talks took place is Oded Ketch, who after a long period of talks that did not progress too much – last week things finally took a positive turn. Maccabi already realized several months ago that Maktesh was not suitable to coach the team – and his stock rose greatly among the management in the last season, in which he was able to navigate and maintain the squad despite all the difficulties and flights, when even the loss in the cup final did not change the perception of him. Ketch is expected to earn almost double the salary compared to what he earned in the previous two seasons and should sign a new contract for two more years.
The agreement with Ketch apparently contradicts all the problems and financial difficulties surrounding the next season of Maccabi Tel Aviv, which, as mentioned, is in financial uncertainty regarding the next season. But even if the budget will decrease compared to “normal” seasons, the Maccabi management was clear that keeping Ketch, even in the amount Higher, is the first goal for the next season. There is no suitable and better coach than him, both for this specific squad and for a team that is located in a country that has been fighting for over seven months – and does not really see the end.
The next big question is what to do with the players who hold the next contract. Again, in standard seasons there was no hesitation: everyone would continue, unless there was another professional need. But in the current case, there are two problems: the first is of course budgetary and the second is the will of the players themselves.
As far as the financial matter is concerned, the management of Maccabi Tel Aviv has decided that it will do everything in its power to keep the existing staff and meet all the obligations to the players who have a contract. How will this happen financially? It is not yet clear. ), when the shareholders will also have to put their hands in their pockets in this case.
But despite Maccabi Tel Aviv’s desire to keep everyone, it is still not certain that it will be able to do it on a financial level – and it may have to part with senior players even though they are under contract. The release of Lorenzo Brown, for that matter, who earns over 1.5 million dollars (and is in a worse season compared to the previous season), can help her in two ways: she will both save his salary and receive compensation for him as a buy-out, a million dollars according to the estimates, from a team that will want his services – as she did with Scotty Wilvkin and Ante Zizic The compensation that Maccabi received in exchange for them in the summer of 2022 helped them, among other things, in signing Brown and Baldwin.
The second – and no less big – problem is the will of the players themselves to continue. The war is still in progress, and its consequences weigh heavily on the players and their families. Baldwin, for example, said in an interview on the Sports Channel that he does not know if he will be able to get through another year like this, of sacrifice that includes not only the fear of war and missiles, but also, above all, multiple flights and a home hall located abroad. Therefore, Maccabi Tel Aviv’s biggest fear is that the players The seniors, such as Baldwin or Colson, will themselves ask to leave in light of the situation and in light of the fact that they will be able to receive high sums in other groups as well.
The ideal scenario as far as Maccabi Tel Aviv is concerned is that in the coming months a cease-fire agreement will be reached or the war will end and it will be possible to host games at the hall again. ), in that case she will have to work hard to convince players to stay and it will not be easy for her to add new players, they hope that the fact that Ketch has an excellent connection with the current staff will also help in keeping the stars, with an emphasis on Baldwin and Coulson.
Of course, all these plans, wishes and thoughts will become irrelevant in the most extreme case – where the Euroleague decides that Maccabi Tel Aviv will not be able to continue playing in the factory, if it cannot host at home for an entire season. The above issue came up for discussion during last season, but Shimon Mizrachi, Danny Federman and David Federman, who represented Maccabi in that dramatic debate, managed to block the idea that was led by the Spanish and Turkish teams at the time. The estimates at Maccabi Tel Aviv are that the team will continue to play in the Euroleague next season as well, but like almost every issue that has surrounded Maccabi in recent times – there is no 100 percent certainty.
Bottom line, after many months in which Maccabi Tel Aviv’s preparations for the next season were stuck, recently things started to move. The increasingly close signing of Ketch will be the first move, when in the near term the management will build the budget plan for the next one and then the team will also start operating in the player market. A lot of challenges still await Maccabi Tel Aviv next season, it has a whole summer to try to solve them all.
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