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Weekly Sports League and Franchise Report

by Dan Krieger
March 14, 2016 - ECHL (ECHL)


BASEBALL

Eastern League: The new owner of the Binghamton (NY) Mets, or B-Mets, in the Double-A Eastern League announced plans to change the teams name for the 2017 season. Potential team names will be accepted from fans starting next month and six names will be selected for voting later in the month. The new team name will not be announced until after the 2016 season. The team has been called the Mets since moving from Williamsport (PA) for the 1992 season.

Desert League: The proposed new independent Desert League plans to start its inaugural fall season later this year with four participating teams based around Yuma (AZ). The league recently announced its first team for 2016 will be the San Luis (AZ) Dorados. The Desert League season will run from September 24 through November 22.

BASKETBALL

North American Basketball League: The new NABL made some revisions to the 12 teams that will be aligned into six-team Eastern and Western divisions for the inaugural season starting next month. The Missouri Quake (Essex) is gone from the Eastern Division and the Gulf Coast Wizards (Gulfport, MS) have been moved from the Western to the Eastern Division. A team called the Shreveport-Bossier Flight was added to the Western Division and the Western Division's Louisiana Cajun All Stars have been renamed the New Orleans Cajun All Stars.

East Coast Basketball League: The ECBL recently started its second season with 12 teams aligned into six-team Northern and Southern divisions. The league had ten teams last season, but lost three teams and added five new teams. The Carolina Gladiators (Lumberton, NC), Gastonia (NC) Crowns and Queen City Express (Charlotte, NC) did not return, but the Carolina Mpact (Anson County, NC), Petersburg (VA) Revolution, Raleigh-Durham (NC) United Raptors, Winston-Salem (NC) Certified and South Carolina Upstate Redhawks (Greenville) were added for 2016.

Circuito de Baloncesto de la Costa del Pacifico (CIBACOPA): Mexico's Pacific Coast Basketball League known as the CIBACOPA, which is the country's second professional basketball league next to the Liga Nacional de Baloncesto Profesional (LNBP), started its 2016 season last weekend with 11 teams aligned in one table. The Mineros de Cananea (Sonora) relocated to become the Vaqueros de Aqua Prieta (Sonora) for 2016. The other nine teams have returned and the league added the new Halcones de Ciudad Obregon as the 11th team. The CIBACOPA had a previous Vaqueros de Aqua Prieta team that played in the 2007 and 2008 seasons. Ciudad Obregon had a previous CIBACOPA team called the Trigueros that last played in the 2013 season.

Women's United States Basketball Association: The proposed WUSBA, which has been trying to get off the ground with a summertime season since 2010, announced in January that there are initial arena agreements in place for 10 of the 12 teams planning to start play in the summer of 2016. As of now, teams include the Atlanta Platinum, Birmingham Starz, Chicago Cagerz, Dallas Dynasty, Houston Galaxy, Indiana Royal (Bloomington), Kansas City Blaze, Minnesota River Hawks (Minneapolis), New Orleans Pzazz and Pittsburgh Privateers. The league will start with ten teams if arena deals cannot be worked out in two other locations.

American Basketball Association: The ABA recently announced new teams called the Fredericksburg (VA) Grizzlies, Carolina Cougars (Columbia, SC) and a yet-to-be-named team in Salina (KS) have been added for next season.

FOOTBALL

Arena Football League: The AFL announced an ownership group in Washington (DC) has acquired an AFL franchise that will start play in the city for the 2017 season. A team called the Washington Commandos played in the inaugural 1987 season of the original AFL, sat out the 1988 season, returned as the Maryland Commandos in 1989 and played again as the Washington Commandos in their final season of 1990. The owner of the National Football League's Washington Redskins bought the rights to an AFL team in 1999, but a proposed team called the Washington Warriors never materialized. The AFL is playing with only eight teams in 2016, but is focusing on additional expansion into other major U.S. markets.

Indoor Football League: The owner of the IFL's Loveland-based Colorado Crush franchise was diagnosed with a terminal illness and has put the team up for sale. The owner is working with the league to find an ownership group that will keep the team in the area beyond the 2016 season. The team started as the Colorado Ice and played its first two seasons (2007-08) in United Indoor Football (UIF). The team became part of the IFL through a merger of the UIF and Intense Football League for the 2009 season. The Ice changed its name to the Colorado Crush for the 2016 season.

North American Indoor Football: The NAIF started its first full season this weekend with seven teams called the Austin Colts, Dallas Silverbacks, East Texas Timber Rattlers (Lufkin), Kearney (NE) Hawks (travel team), Tampico (Mexico) Lagartos, Texas Grim Reapers (North Richland Hills) and Texas Stealth (North Richland Hills). The Texas Stealth and Dallas Silverbacks had been associated with the semi-pro Texas Indoor Gridiron League, while the Tampico Legartos were part of Mexico's arena football league known as the Liga Extrema de Futbol Americano (LEXFA). The NAIF had a few teams that played what was called a "mini-season" in the first half of 2015 as the National Pro-Indoor Football, which became simply the NAIF under new ownership in June 2015.

During its development over the past year or so, the NAIF has had numerous proposed teams come and go. The NAIF lost some of its originally proposed teams like the New Mexico Stars (Rio Rancho), Georgia Firebirds, Mile High Menace (Denver)/Steel City Menace (Pueblo) and Pineywood Bucks (Henderson, TX), to the 2016 American Indoor Football with Pineywood eventually dropping out. The Kentucky Knights (Owensboro) moved to the Supreme Indoor Football, the Windy City Ravens (Elgin, IL) moved to the new Midwest Professional Indoor Football and the Orlando-based Florida Wildcats joined the proposed Indoor Global Football League. Some other previously announced NAIF teams that later disappeared were the Palm Beach Phantoms, Tunica (MS) Stallions, Broward Outlaws, Steel City Stampede (Bethlehem, PA), Texas Bulldogs (Frisco), North Texas Crunch, Iowa Elite, Dallas Roughriders, Charleston (SC) Ravens and the Augusta (GA) Gladiators/CSRA Gladiators (Aiken, SC).

HOCKEY

ECHL: The city of Brampton (Ontario) has agreed to a three-year plan to provide $1.5 million in financial support to its ECHL team called the Brampton Beast. The team's ownership announced early last month that the team had suffered significant losses in its first three years of operation and would not be able to play next season if it did not get some financial help from the city. The league had granted the team an extension until March 10 to get its finances in order and commit to a 2016-17 season.

Federal Hockey League: Renovations of the Watertown Municipal Arena are nearing completion and it is hoped the city's FHL team called the Watertown (NY) Wolves will return as promised for the 2016-17 season. The Watertown Wolves played their first season in 2014-15, but were forced to sit out the 2015-16 season due to construction on its home arena.

SOCCER

United Soccer League: The USL officially announced the new ownership for the league's Rochester (NY) Rhinos, so that should keep the team in the city for the 2016 season and beyond. The league terminated the previous ownership of the team in January 2016 and was prepared to operate the team until new ownership was found. Apparently, there was interest from other prospective buyers that wanted to relocate the team.

OTHER

World Series of Boxing: The team-based international boxing league called the World Series of Boxing started its sixth season in January with 16 teams aligned into four-team groups (A, B, C and D). The Algeria Desert Hawks and Italia Thunder did not return from last season, but the Turkiye Conquerors (Turkey) and Uzbek Tigers (Uzbekistan) were added. The United States and Mexico are represented by teams called the USA Knockouts and the Mexico Guerreros in Group B. The season runs from mid-January to early April.

Dan Krieger is the creator of the Leagues, Teams & Nicknames 2014-15: "The Leagueology Almanac" , which tracks the changes in league alignments, franchise movements and team nicknames in today's sports world. The publication is currently available at www.amazon.com.

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