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There's Still an ABA?


hettinger_rl

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I was reading about how the Orlando Magic are taking steps to get their own D-League team when I was shocked. The article said that the team they may aquire woulf be the 2 time ABA champion Jacksonville Giants. That's right ABA. I was intrigued so I looked up the league; they have teams scattered all over the country, small markets, big markets, unknown teams, former D-League teams. One thing they all have in common though.... bad logos!

http://www.abalive.com/teams/

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Stingrays are just laughable. Indiana State Warriors is a complete ripoff of the Magic logo-wise and Golden State name wise, so are the assault and blitz, which makes no sense at all.

HOWEVER, unless they're ripoff as well, Utah avalanche and South Florida Spartans are decent

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http://www.abalive.com/teams/

Oh God it's gotten worse, but I don't know how. I also didn't know the Gwizzlies were still alive.

On 8/1/2010 at 4:01 PM, winters in buffalo said:
You manage to balance agitation with just enough salient points to keep things interesting. Kind of a low-rent DG_Now.
On 1/2/2011 at 9:07 PM, Sodboy13 said:
Today, we are all otaku.

"The city of Peoria was once the site of the largest distillery in the world and later became the site for mass production of penicillin. So it is safe to assume that present-day Peorians are descended from syphilitic boozehounds."-Stephen Colbert

POTD: February 15, 2010, June 20, 2010

The Glorious Bloom State Penguins (NCFAF) 2014: 2-9, 2015: 7-5 (L Pineapple Bowl), 2016: 1-0 (NCFAB) 2014-15: 10-8, 2015-16: 14-5 (SMC Champs, L 1st Round February Frenzy)

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They had a team play in one of the nearby athletic centers two years ago during the lockout. The NoVA Wonders, complete with obligatory red, white, and blue ball logo. They played about three or four games, then were never heard of again right after the lockout was over. I wanted to see a game, if only for laughs and to see what $40 and A Dream would've bought if they kept up with that.

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We had a team here in Beaumont, the Southeast Texas Mustangs that changed to the Mavericks. Played at Ford Arena then the owner moved them to his rodeo/entertainment center called Nutty Jerry's in tiny Winnie. They crushed the league including the Giants. Won back to back title then figured they could get in the NBDL. Needless to say the lack of support and strange arena kept that from happening. At least they went out on top.

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Finally, something in my wheelhouse. I followed the Nashville Rhythm in 2004-06, when their looney-tune co-owner hired a woman with no coaching experience (my cousin, Ashley McElhiney from Vanderbilt) as the first female head coach of a men's professional basketball team in US history. That was the first time the team briefly made national headlines--the second being when said owner tried to fire her handpicked coach publicly coming out of halftime, for paying a former NBA player on a 2-game contract. The owner was swearing so much and causing such a scene (at religious Lipscomb University's Allen Arena) that the OWNER had to be removed from the building. She was basically taken out of an ownership role and given a desk job, and the coach was un-fired days before a game in her honor in a tiny town an hour or so away from Nashville. By the way, the team finished fourth in the standings, then folded without discussing things with the coach or players, saying that we'd lost too many players to be competitive and it wasn't fair to the other teams to take the spot. The team was sold in the offseason, and played a half of a season floating thru high school gyms instead of having a home floor, before folding.

Rhythm home games were awesome, with great-in-league-terms crowds, a PA announcer, cheerleaders I believe, and even a projector showing graphics and such. I went to a Rhythm road game (where we wore black uniforms with black numbers, chain-stitched in white) at the Reigning Knights of Georgia, which I think won two games in two seasons....and I don't think I've had a worse experience at a ballgame. The game was held at a private high school in the Atlanta suburbs. I think there were more players and support staff than fans in the stands. And I don't remember any frills for the fans, as in PA, cheerleaders, halftime entertainment....I'm sure there had to be SOMETHING there, but I don't recall any of it. I've seen better experiences at middle school games, and I'm not exaggerating.

I did see a great playoff game between the Long Beach Jam and the Las Vegas Rattlers in Long Beach, with a solid crowd and a great atmosphere, but the game was an absolute rout. One unique aspect they had was the "Celebrity 11th Man" where every team could sign whoever they wanted as a benchwarmer, and at the end of the game could actually play them. LB actually had a salt-and-pepper-haired, portly city councilman, who tried and failed to defend the other team's star point guard, but did score the last bucket the Jam had all night in the win. Another quirky ABA rule is called "3-D," where if Team A turns the ball over before establishing possession in the front-court, Team B gets an extra point if they score that possession. I actually saw a guy hit four 4-pointers in one half, and not score again the rest of the game.

Surprised to see Utah have a team again. They lost one game the entire season (to the Arkansas RimRockers), and made the Final Four of the playoffs with a chance to avenge the loss against Arkansas. Instead, the team folded with no explanation, Arkansas won the league title, and their owner went to the ABA commish and said "Step down, and make me commissioner, or we walk." The ABA sent Arkansas packing, where they joined the D-League and died a very painful death over two seasons, if memory serves.

I swear, the league is a comedy-of-errors movie waiting to happen. It's Slap Shot meets Semi-Pro (with no one willing to buy) meets...idk, maybe BASEketball?

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Go Gators. Go Blue Raiders. Go Commodores. Go USC Trojans.

Preds & Avs.

Braves, Rays, & Dodgers.

Titans, Colts, Broncos, Cardinals.

Grizzlies. 14ers, Jam.

Team Spirit + Laziness = Yay.

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