Changing Landscape of the NBA

The NBA is changing and I don't think for the better. It's becoming a lot like the MLB, and I don't mean that in a good way. There's no salary cap in baseball, meaning teams can sign players for as much money as they want without it counting against them. This is why teams like the Yankees and Red Sox have the best players every year, they can offer more money than anyone else. Neither team is dependent on their farm system because they can afford to sign which ever type of player they feel they need.
The NBA does have a salary cap, which is meant to uphold some sort of competitive balance. Well, all of that went out the window with the signings of Wade, Bosh, and James to Miami. The salary cap was established to award contracts based on performance. In this way, teams would be able to build around one or two stars and surround them with marginal role players.
But when superstar players take less money to play with each other, the point of the salary cap is lost. Competitive balance no longer applies when superstars team up, and good role players take less money to play with them.
Assuming this sparks a new trend, here's the real loser in this shift in paradigm: small market teams.
There's more that goes into free agency than wins and losses, dollars and cents. Players choose teams based off the appeal of the city and the availability of marketing revenue. Both factors are obviously lacking in smaller markets.
Let's take a look back at the 90s for example. In the 1990s, star players were much more likely to stick with the team that drafted them, at least through their prime years. Many star players even spent their entire careers in one city.

Names like Malone, Stockton, Miller, and Robinson all spent their entire careers with one team, in not-so-popular destinations. Take Salt Lake City, Indianapolis, and San Antonio. All small markets, not particularly popular areas to visit, with a lack of marketing opportunities. So how do these places lure free agents?
They don't. The Jazz were lucky enough to draft Malone and Stockton and then build around them. When both guys stayed, other players gravitated there to play with them. If they left, the team was screwed. Fast forward to Salt Lake City modern day. Carlos Boozer is gone, role players like Kyle Korver and most likely Ronnie Brewer are gone. Deron Williams is left by himself and will probably be packing his bags in 2012.
The same formula was true with the Spurs. They had an aging superstar in Robinson, were lucky enough to get the number one pick to draft Duncan, and absolutely stole Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili in the late first round and second round, respectively. Role players gravitated towards that team.
The point is that neither of these cities, and throw Indianapolis in there too has been able to recruit a high profile free agent to sign with them. Their success has been due draft picks that panned out. If those draft picks decide to leave, they're back to rebuilding.
Herein lies the problem with the "new way of doing things." If draft picks (James, Bosh) sign their rookie deals and then four year extensions, and plan on leaving if the team hasn't won yet, they are creating a very small window of opportunity. Remember, it took Jordan seven years to win a title. Small markets just can get back in the mix with big name free agent signings, losing a player of James or Bosh caliber can set a small marketfranchise back seven to ten years. We're currently seeing this in Minneapolis now that KG is gone.
Just to get it straight the highest profile players this free agency left Cleveland, Toronto, Salt Lake City, and Phoenix to go to Miami, Chicago, and New York. I'm not a travel expert, but something tells me the latter are more desirable places to visit and live. And the whole "taking less money" thing is a joke, the Miami trio will easily make up what they didn't get in contract money with endorsement opportunities.
Is there any hope for the small markets? Just maybe, and his name is Kevin Durant. While all of this was going on, Durant signed a five year extension to stay in, of all places, Oklahoma City. Don't get excited just yet though, once upon a time, LeBron James signed an extension to stay in Cleveland too.