ABA CEO Joe Newman responds to cancellation, playoff questions

by Paul Reeths
March 14, 2008 - American Basketball Association (ABA)


The following are American Basketball Association CEO Joe Newman's answers to several questions posed to him through email about the ABA playoffs and a pair of cancelled games in Halifax. The responses have not been edited. Bolded comments represent the original questions posed to Mr. Newman through email. Several of the issues addressed below were brought up in freelance writer Chris Munson's recent article about the Halifax cancellation.

When asked why the Georgia Gwizzlies and West Texas Whirlwinds dropped out of the playoffs Friday, hours before a scheduled postseason game:

The Georgia Gwizzlies and the West Texas Whirlwinds did not drop out of the playoffs today. To be eligible for the ABA playoffs, a player had to have played at least 3 regular season games with the team. West Texas was on their way to Macon when we found that neither team had a complete roster with players who had played at least 3 regular season games and the league advised them that they were playoff ineligible.

Atlanta was award the bye seat in the playoffs from the South joining Texas as one of the two South representatives in the playoffs. There will be four from the Northeast, two from the west and two from the south.

When asked what repercussions there would be for Bahama cancelling a road trip to Halifax the day of a game:

The repercussions from Bahama's last minute cancellation were considerable. It caused Halifax to have to move a game from Thursday until Friday. Atlanta stepped in and will play both tonight and tomorrow night. I'm sure fans were disappointed, but Friday/Saturday should increase the attendance over Thursday/Friday. It also created some "hard feelings" between Halifax and the league as to who's blame it was for Bahamas failing to make the trip. Bahama's was at the airport ready to fly to Halifax, but their flight through Toronto would have gotten them to Halifax too late on Thursday and Halifax decided to change the game dates.

The decision of Bahamas to play in Halifax was made by the two teams; the league was not involved in any of the scheduling and was unaware that a problem existed until earlier this week. The league did everything it could to encourage Bahamas to make the trip and got a commitment from them to make the trip. They also said that they would send me an email with the sequence of events and indicate that the league was not involved. It has not been an easy season for Halifax because it is not easy to get to and from Halifax. But they have done a tremendous job getting teams there and meeting their US/Canada commitment and deserve a lot of credit for the outstanding effort they have made. I do not want to be at odds with them. Sometimes when things don't happen as you hope they will happen, there is a hasty reaction.

When asked why just over 38 percent of scheduled ABA games were played this season:

I am not sure what percentage of games were played this season; I will check to see if that is accurate. It is obvious that the ABA lost some teams and it was difficult to schedule games. The ABA teams worked diligently to play as many games as possible - including 10-15 teams to Singapore to play games (which took many teams out of action for a week or more).

When asked why he changed the quote from the Halifax Rainmen's Andre Livingston, who expressed disappointment in the league over the schedule change:

In retrospect, it might have been better to delete the quote. But it is not a matter of ethics. The fact is that many teams, many, send in raw facts and ask me to edit, re-write, create, etc their releases and to include quotes. It is done regularly and with the permission of most. Like you, I am sensitive to the written word and want what is on the ABA web site to be in the best interests of the ABA and its teams.

As you know, I write anywhere from 3-6 releases a day, five days a week. An average, I would suggest of about 13 release per week - or over 600 releases a year. In the three years I have been doing this, I have sent out about 2000 releases. This is the second time in those 2000 releases that anyone has EVER questioned anything I've written, including quotes. Many of my quotes in the releases come from conversations that I have with the people who send me the information. With all due respect to Halifax, I have edited quite a few grammatical and punctuation errors in their releases and have never been questioned. I apologized to them this morning for the change. Perhaps I should not have taken the liberty with such a sensitive subject.

Hopefully you will print and distribute this in its entirety. Thank you.

Joe Newman

ABA CEO

Note: OurSports Central no longer actively covers the American Basketball Association (ABA) as a professional league due in part to its inability to publish and play a schedule and the transitory nature of many of its teams. For information on professional minor leagues, please see OSC's basketball section.



American Basketball Association Stories from March 14, 2008


The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer(s), and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.


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