Explorers 96 Minot 95 Great Win!!!

[Chuck the Writer]

At this point, here's what I would do if I had any power in the CBA.

Monday morning - call in the letters of credit on Great Falls and Atlanta.

Pull both teams out of their respective cities.

Move Great Falls to either Rapid City or Fargo and make them at least finish the season. If nothing, it gives Minot a travel partner. Or move Great Falls to Wichita or to Wichita Falls (pardon me, I'm having a Pat Metheny and Lyle Mays flashback), or maybe to Enid or Dodge City or one of the old stable USBL franchise cities.

As for the Krunk, move them out of Atlanta and put them in Brooklyn. Make them finish their schedule at LIU. Maybe even get Kenny Charles to cough up those old Brooklyn Kings uniforms for 'em. If nothing else, it gives Albany a travel partner for the rest of the year.

Of course, I'm not in the CBA head office, so I would have no idea what the powers that be might have regarding same.

But if anybody moves one of those franchises to Utica, I want a royalty check now.

[psbf]

Royalty or reality?

[Chuck the Writer]

[quote=""psbf""]Royalty or reality?[/quote]

First funny one you've come up with in a long time, psbf.

[jbirdmontana]

That is a crappy idea to move the team, how would that improve the situation of poor communication within the Explorers. As for Acra the only person he stays in touch with is Justin Wetzel, the assistant coach, who knew that the game wasnt gonna be played so that is why he was there. I know about as much about the situation as any one can know seems that one of the players live with me and I went out to the club with them, plus I know the teams biggest sponsor. So I know that the whole problem is a lack of solid communication within the organization. If you asked Tuckman he would say one thing, then Wedman would say something else, no one knows what the truth is around here. There is so much crap going on around here, the players are all at least 2 paychecks behind, Marlyn Bryant is here living with me and he hasn't even signed a contract with the team. I hope there is a positive solution in the matter.

[Chuck the Writer]

[quote=""jbirdmontana""]That is a crappy idea to move the team, how would that improve the situation of poor communication within the Explorers. As for Acra the only person he stays in touch with is Justin Wetzel, the assistant coach, who knew that the game wasnt gonna be played so that is why he was there. I know about as much about the situation as any one can know seems that one of the players live with me and I went out to the club with them, plus I know the teams biggest sponsor. So I know that the whole problem is a lack of solid communication within the organization. If you asked Tuckman he would say one thing, then Wedman would say something else, no one knows what the truth is around here. There is so much crap going on around here, the players are all at least 2 paychecks behind, Marlyn Bryant is here living with me and he hasn't even signed a contract with the team. I hope there is a positive solution in the matter.[/quote]

JBM - Here's the situation, from what I can glean from message boards like OSC (which ain't exactly the AP for sources) and the Great Falls Tribune. The Explorers are in serious trouble. They were in serious trouble before Michael Tuckman bought the team, they were drawing 200 a night. Something happened with all the sponsorship money. And the team was getting killed by everybody else in the league. Even RGV took two wins from you. Yeah, you had a great come-from-behind victory over Minot, but by then you've got players coming and going, you've got an owner who claims to have fired the coach, a coach who claims he quit, one guy showing up to play and everybody else is in street clothes or not in the building, players allegedly not getting paid (I'm saying allegedly because it's only been reported on OSC and not in the GF Tribune or the TV stations), etc. All I was saying is that maybe it's time to cut bait in Great Falls and maybe, if a new sponsorship or ownership group comes in for 2008-09, start fresh. It's happened at least twice in CBA history - the Connecticut Pride moved in when the Hartford Hellcats went rigor mortis in the 1994-95 season; and the La Crosse Bobcats came in after the La Crosse Catbirds went out. So there is precedent for this happening.

[psbf]

a little on history, the LaCrosse Catbirds moved here to become the Pittsburgh Piranhas(1995).

[Alumni96]

[quote=""Chuck the Writer""]JBM - Here's the situation, from what I can glean from message boards like OSC (which ain't exactly the AP for sources) and the Great Falls Tribune. The Explorers are in serious trouble. They were in serious trouble before Michael Tuckman bought the team, they were drawing 200 a night. Something happened with all the sponsorship money. And the team was getting killed by everybody else in the league. Even RGV took two wins from you. Yeah, you had a great come-from-behind victory over Minot, but by then you've got players coming and going, you've got an owner who claims to have fired the coach, a coach who claims he quit, one guy showing up to play and everybody else is in street clothes or not in the building, players allegedly not getting paid (I'm saying allegedly because it's only been reported on OSC and not in the GF Tribune or the TV stations), etc. All I was saying is that maybe it's time to cut bait in Great Falls and maybe, if a new sponsorship or ownership group comes in for 2008-09, start fresh. It's happened at least twice in CBA history - the Connecticut Pride moved in when the Hartford Hellcats went rigor mortis in the 1994-95 season; and the La Crosse Bobcats came in after the La Crosse Catbirds went out. So there is precedent for this happening.[/quote]

Chuck, are the explorers likely to draw more than 200 fans in a new city? I understand the theory of cutting the travel costs but doesn't Great Falls already have a travel partner with Butte? If the league is gonna step in and run this team, don't they have an obligation to sponsors to do so in Great Falls at least to the end of the season?

[jbirdmontana]

Yes it is true about our team not being very good I am not basing any of my statements on that. I have said all along we aint that good but we can improve with a few new experienced players. I know players are not getting paid what they are owed, and they havent been paid for 2 weeks and they were not paid in full the last time. This is a fact I spoke with Nate Johnson, Keith Salshider and a few others, and they told me this. I just hope this works out somehow.

[psbf]

what you mean when you say that the GF Tribune did not mention the players not being paid, Chuck. They had it mentioned in today's article; http://www.greatfallstribune.com

[Chuck the Writer]

[quote=""psbf""]what you mean when you say that the GF Tribune did not mention the players not being paid, Chuck. They had it mentioned in today's article; http://www.greatfallstribune.com[/quote]

I want to make sure that a second source other than OSC said that they missed a paycheck. Sometimes it takes a few days for all the information to come out, and I'd rather it was confirmed in a print or televised media than have someone come on OSC and say "hey this happened" and we all run and believe it.