Continental Basketball Association
The Continental Basketball Association, originally known as the Eastern Pennsylvania Basketball League, and later as the Eastern Professional Basketball League and the Eastern Basketball Association, was a men's professional basketball minor league in the United States from 1946 to 2009.
History
20th century
The Continental Basketball Association was founded on April 23, 1946, under its previous name, the Eastern Pennsylvania Basketball League. It was organized on in Hazleton, Pennsylvania by Eddie White of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, Robert Jamelli of Hazleton and Ron Regar of Reading, Pennsylvania. George Z. Keller of Wilkes-Barre was the league's first commissioner. It went on to bill itself as the "World's Oldest Professional Basketball League", since its founding pre-dated the founding of the National Basketball Association by two months. The league fielded six franchises, five of which were in Pennsylvania: Allentown, Hazleton, Lancaster, Reading, and Wilkes-Barre. A sixth team, Binghamton, was located in New York, but moved to Pottsville in Pennsylvania mid-season. The first season opened on December 1, 1946.The following season, Allentown withdrew from the EPBL, and the Wilkes-Barre team was sold to Williamsport. Teams were added in Philadelphia, Harrisburg and Sunbury, making eight teams in the EPBL that year.
In 1948, the league was renamed the Eastern Professional Basketball League, and additional franchises were added in three additional Pennsylvania cities, Williamsport, Scranton, and Sunbury, three New Jersey cities, Trenton, Camden, and Asbury Park, three in Connecticut, New Haven, Hartford, Bridgeport, and in Wilmington, Delaware, and Springfield, Massachusetts.
From the 1950s through the 1960s, many NBA teams had unofficial quotas on the number of black players on their teams. Many players joined other professional leagues, including the EPBL. The league was fast and physical, often played in tiny, smoke-filled gyms across the Northeastern United States, and featuring the best players who could not make many NBA teams because of the quotas.
Following the lead of the American Basketball League in adding a three-point line, the Eastern League added a three-point line for its 1964–65 season. Although three-point shots during the 1960s were few and far between, the Eastern League developed several scorers who used the three-point shot to their advantage.
For the 1970–71 season, the league rebranded itself the Eastern Basketball Association, operating as a professional Northeastern regional league and as an unofficial feeder system to the NBA and ABA. The CBA's first commissioner was Harry Rudolph, father of NBA referee Mendy Rudolph. Steve A. Kauffman, currently a basketball agent, succeeded Rudolph as commissioner in 1975. Kauffman executed a plan to bring the Anchorage Northern Knights into the league beginning with the 1977–78 season. Kauffman kept the league name because he felt having a team in the Eastern League from Alaska might get the league additional notice and recognition. The establishment of the Anchorage franchise garnered national media attention, including a feature story in Sports Illustrated.
Kauffman served as commissioner until 1978, when his deputy commissioner, Jim Drucker, took the reins. Drucker's eight-season reign was the longest in the league's history. Drucker, son of NBA referee Norm Drucker, continued as commissioner until 1986.
As commissioner, the league was renamed the Continental Basketball Association in 1978, eventually leading to expansion across the country.
During Drucker's term, the league expanded from 8 to 14 teams, landed its first national TV contracts and saw franchise values increase from $5,000 to $500,000, an aggregate increase in equity value from $24,000 to $7 million. The league instituted novel rule changes including sudden-death overtime, a no foul-out rule and a change in the way league standings were determined. Under the "7-Point System", seven points were awarded each game: three points for winning a game and one point for every quarter a team won. As a result, a winning team would wind up with four to seven points in the standings, while a losing team could collect from zero to three points. This made for at least some fan interest even in the late stages of games that were otherwise blowouts; the trailing team could still get a standings point by winning the final quarter, especially if the team that was leading chose to rest some or all of its starters. The league used this method to calculate division standings from its implementation in 1983 until the league's end in 2009.
After Darryl Dawkins shattered two basketball backboards during the 1979–80 NBA season, the NBA used the CBA to test an innovation as part of the basket, the breakaway rim, in the 1980–81 CBA season. Three designs were chosen to be used in games, being chosen from ten prototype designs. Several college basketball players were asked to try to break the rims before being introduced in the CBA. When force was placed upon the spring-loaded rim, it would be pulled down, then spring safely back in place. The NBA and CBA adopted the most resilient design among the three for the 1981–82 season.
Also during this time, the CBA created a series of halftime promotions. The most successful was the "1 Million Dollar CBA Supershot". In an era where the typical basketball halftime promotion, even in NCAA Division I and the NBA, featured a winning prize worth less than $100, the CBA's Supershot, created in 1983, offered a grand prize of $1 million if a randomly selected fan could hit one shot from the far foul line,. No one won the insured prize, but the shot attracted national media coverage in Sports Illustrated, The New York Times, and The Sporting News.
In 1984, the CBA signed a cable television contract with BET with 10 CBA games televised on a tape delay. For national media attention, the league created the "CBA Sportscaster Contest" to select a color commentator for its BET telecasts. With tryouts nationwide, the promotion was featured on the NBC Nightly News, Entertainment Tonight, Sports Illustrated and other media. The contest was won by a NJ high school basketball coach, Bill Lange, who later coached the Philadelphia Spirit minor league team in the United States Basketball League.
After two tape-delayed seasons on BET, CBA games moved to ESPN, with 13 games televised live. ESPN sportscaster Bob Ley did the play-by-play and former NBA player and coach Kevin Loughery provided color commentary. Drucker left as Commissioner, and his TV production company, Global Sports, produced the ESPN telecasts.
In 1985, the CBA followed with the "Ton-of-Money Free Throw", which featured a prize of of pennies if a randomly selected fan could make just one free throw. Two of fourteen contestants were successful. The next year, the league featured the "Easy Street Shootout". In that shootout, 14 contestants, one from each CBA city, were selected and the person making the longest shot won a $1,000,000 zero-coupon bond. The winner was Don Mattingly of the Evansville Thunder, unrelated to the New York Yankee baseball player. After the league's 1985 All-Star Game in Casper, Wyoming, the CBA invited fans to make a paper airplane from the centerfold of their game program, each identified with a unique serial number, and attempt to throw it through the moon roof of a new Ford Thunderbird parked at mid-court. Four fans were successful and a tie-breaker determined the winner who drove home with the new $17,000 car.
In August 1999, the CBA's teams were purchased by an investment group led by former NBA star Isiah Thomas. The group bought all of the individually owned franchises of the CBA, in a $10 million acquisition. Over the course of the next 18 months, Thomas was faced with a plethora of business troubles, losing the league's partnership with the NBA and ultimately abandoning the league into a blind trust that left teams unable to meet payroll or pay bills. The combined-ownership plan was unsuccessful and, by 2001, the CBA had declared bankruptcy and ceased operations; it folded on February 8, 2001, without managing to complete the 2000–01 season.
21st century
Before the 2000–01 season, the CBA signed a television contract with BET to broadcast up to 18 games, including the CBA All-Star Game, although the CBA folded midway through the season. Several of its teams briefly joined the now-defunct International Basketball League.Highlights of Thomas's ownership of the CBA included:
- August 3, 1999: Former NBA star Isiah Thomas purchases the CBA for $10 million. He says that the league will now operate as a single-owner entity, and the CBA will continue to be the official developmental league of the NBA.
- October 7, 1999: Sale of the CBA to Thomas is finalized. Thomas pays $5 million up front, agreeing to make four additional payments to the CBA's former team owners for the remainder of the debt.
- October 24, 1999: He announces salary cuts in the CBA. The average salary of $1,500 per week will be reduced to $1,100, with rookies getting $800. Thomas' reasoning is that by reducing the number of veterans in the league, there will be more young players available for NBA teams.
- March 2000: The NBA offers Thomas $11 million plus a percentage of the profits for the CBA. Thomas chooses not to sell.
- June 28, 2000: Thomas is offered the head coaching job of the NBA's Indiana Pacers. Since NBA rules forbid a coach from owning his own league, Thomas is obliged to sell the CBA. On this day, Thomas signs a letter of intent to sell the CBA to the NBA Players' Association.
- Summer 2000: After 20 years of using the CBA as its developmental league, the NBA announces it will form its own minor-league feeder system, creating the National Basketball Development League. The CBA will no longer be the NBA's official developmental league following the end of the 2001 season.
- October 2, 2000: Thomas places the league into a blind trust and becomes head coach of the Pacers.
- February 8, 2001: The CBA suspends play midway through the 2000–2001 season. The blind trust that had hoped to find a new owner for the league abandons its efforts, and the league has over $2 million in debts. The teams are offered back to their original owners for a $1 simple consideration, and several owners accept the offer. Many more refuse, and their clubs go under.
- February 24, 2001: The CBA declares bankruptcy. Five former CBA team owners repurchase their franchises and join the rival International Basketball League to finish the season. Other owners choose to allow their franchises to fail, rather than cover debts that were not theirs originally.
- Summer 2001: The IBL folds.
- November 2001: The CBA reorganizes for the 2001–02 season as former CBA franchises in Rockford, Gary, Grand Rapids and Sioux Falls merge with the smaller International Basketball Association, which has franchises in Bismarck, Fargo and Saskatoon. The Flint Fuze join as an expansion team.
- November 16, 2001: The first game in the history of the National Basketball Developmental League is played.
The 2008–2009 season began with only four teams, instead of the expected five. The Pittsburgh Xplosion folded under unclear circumstances, and the league scheduled games against American Basketball Association teams for the first month of the season in an attempt to stay solvent. The maneuver was not enough. On February 2, 2009, the league announced a halt to operations, turning a scheduled series between the Albany Patroons and Lawton-Fort Sill Cavalry into the league-championship series.