The Rainmen Belong in the NBA D-League.

Chris Parsons recently posted on his blog Section 23 that the Rainmen's average attendance in this inaugual season was just over 1,800 fans per home game.

A couple of months ago, I speculated on the finances of the Rainmen as well as the possibilities that lie before us in terms of other leagues for next season.

I am certain that joining the D-League would propel the Rainmen to another level altogether. We would easily have a minimum of 1,000 more fans at games just from the association with the NBA. Haligonians need a brand name before they commit to anything and the NBA name would do the trick.

As for scheduling, I’ll bet the NBA wouldn’t take any mess from WTCC in terms of getting weekend games, which would probably make it a realistic goal to have an attendance average of 4,000+ fans.

By the way, I am still willing to join in any fractional ownership that is offered to the public, as my finances allow. I think it would be amazing to own a small fraction of a pro basketball team, especially one that is obviously so well-run as the Rainmen. However, Mr. Levingston is an entrepreneur (as I am) so I figure he would likely rather reap the benefits of his risk-taking and hard work, and I can appreciate and respect that.

By the way Chris, I can believe both of Mr. Levingston’s quotes that you mention. At the start of the season, the break-even may have been 2,000 fans. By the time we lost the Daily News and started flying in replacement players from California and Atlanta, I am sure those costs increased substantially.

Here the official website that summarizes the D-League Team Affiliation System.

The D-League teams are affiliated with one to three NBA teams. Most have 2 NBA teams who are “permitted to assign players in their first or second seasons to the D-League.”

From the NBADL official site, there are 65 players in the D-League who have NBA playing experience and there were 18 call-ups this season.

It seems like this league is a good chance for players to get to the big show and a chance for fans to see developing players before they go on to superstardom.

As I mentioned some time ago on this blog, a natural NBA affiliate team for us would be the Toronto Raptors, considering Mr. Levingston’s past association with someone from that organization as well as being the only Canadian team in the NBA. Since the NBADL typically has more than one NBA affiliate per team, I suggest our other affiliate team should be the Celtics.

Nova Scotia has long had a connection with New England, with generations of people moving back and forth over the past couple hundred years between here and “the Boston states”. Most hockey fans in Halifax who are more than 20 years old are either Montreal fans, Toronto fans or Boston fans. Boston’s proximity to Halifax makes it a good second choice as an NBA affiliate team, especially since we get a lot of our TV cable channels from Boston.

Plus, how exciting/potentially profitable would it be to have NBA exhibition games here in Halifax to kick off our season, like we currently have with the NHL hockey games? Just some food for thought.

Of course, all of this is predicated on the idea that we may someday join the NBADL.