FIBA World Cup group stage is boring. Here’s how to fix it

Is this how Spurs fans feel every regular season?

There’s no real challenge for Team USA in group play, at least not since the U.S. started taking international play more seriously in 2006. The Americans are 4-0 this year with an average victory margin of 35 points. Team USA’s group play test, Turkey, hung around for two and a half quarters, lost by 21 and might not make the knockouts.

In a tournament like this, with 24 teams from across the globe, there are necessarily relative stinkers in each group. But in a group with the United States, every team looks like a stinker. There is no parity whatsoever in group play.

And it’s not just this year. In 2010, Team USA finished group play 5-0 with a 25-point average victory margin. In 2006 -- in a tournament Team USA didn’t win -- the Americans finished group play 5-0 with an average victory margin of 23 points. We all enjoy DeMar DeRozan jams and Mason Plumlee shovel passes, but it’s not very interesting basketball.

Team USA isn’t alone. Spain isn’t far off Team USA’s pace in scoring margin (27.5 points per game). Greece has four double-digit wins. Slovenia -- Slovenia! -- is undefeated and winning games by 13 points on average. The tournament has had some thrilling games, but is mainly a litany of blowouts. And as we all know, blowouts are rarely much fun to watch. No wonder U.S. ratings for FIBA play have historically been so low.

The knockouts are something else entirely. When any close game can turn into an Earth-shifting drama with elimination a mistake away, the pull is real. It feels important. Even though Team USA will likely smoke its first two Round of 16 opponents (none of whom will be Spain, Greece or Slovenia, in all likelihood), the drama will be ratcheted up. Americans still won’t watch, if history is any indication, but there’s obvious value in the product. Seeing Kyrie Irving, James Harden and Anthony Davis fight to ward off humiliation? That’s worth watching. Seeing Kenneth Faried destroy some guys who once warmed benches for low-level U.S. colleges? Not so much.

It will get worse too when FIBA expands the field to 32 teams in 2019. Field expansion is a good thing for the rest of the world because it gives emerging basketball nations a solid, attainable goal and grows the global game. But it’s going to toss even more sacrificial lambs in front of Team USA, Spain and the other powers in the meantime. Those international players gain wonderful life experiences going mano a mano against NBA superstars. The NBA superstars get shooting practice and a formal scrimmage. Group play in 2019 might be unwatchable as parity decreases.

This isn’t to say that Team USA should stop participating or that no one should bother watching until the knockouts. But perhaps FIBA could devise a system by which the upper-class teams play each other within one or two groups to fight for seeding (with a couple of those teams getting eliminated in the process) and the lesser teams face off in group play among themselves with a couple of those teams advancing to the knockouts. Let the USAs, the Spains, the Greeces mix it up and entertain the world in high-stakes, non-elimination battles, weed out the powers who left stars at home or who otherwise aren’t up to snuff and let the best of the Davids move on.

Here’s an example of what that’d look like in 2014 based pretty firmly on FIBA rankings.

Those groups are a lot better for everyone. The better teams get legitimate early tests but have great odds of moving on. The lesser teams can build confidence against teams of their own caliber and half still move on.

Meanwhile, there’s a stronger incentive for fans who like competitive basketball to watch early. Team USA might still win every group game by double-digits, but at least it won’t be a procession of 40-point drubbings.