“watch the Brooklyn Nets mop up the floor with the Manhattan Knicks” – classic! :)

Go Nets!

Lets hope there are further positive announcements for the franchise in the coming weeks.

i would take ANY positive announcements. :-)

Lol the manhattan knicks nice try tho…

dosen’t matter if we move to brookyln we will always suck and were not getting lebron. he might be playing at barclays center but not in nets uniform

i hate the knicks but that was a classless statement…

Fire KIKI!!!

Oh, and where’s Amtrak?

Hollah!

@Shawn
In many ways, you are my favorite poster.

the area already has a ton of mass transit options but it definitely needs upgrades. that was one of the biggest problems with the izod center. it just wasnt accessible even if you wanted to spend 2 hours getting there.

Brooklyn Arena and the Nets isn’t neither a project nor an experience…it’s an attitute towards life !!

Gotta get there when it is finally opened even if I have to cross the Atlantic Ocean !
So excited, man…

hmm…no baskeball hoops yet…

Wake up Marty. Your borough is full of Knicks fans – you will be the 2nd most popular team in your own borough and will have little to no support in the rest of the city if the Nets move there. Wake up – NOBODY cares except for 20 or so people on this board and anyone Ratner gave his handouts to.

Does this mean we aren’t moving to Winnipeg?

personally, everyone in my family and all my basketball fan friends are stoked on this. they’re all fed up with the knicks, and what’s more, we dont like being in manhattan. from where i live, it would be a short 30 minute LIRR ride to barclays. me and my cousin will have season tix. they may be cheap seats, but i’ll have ’em.

Little off topic. I’m still recovering from yesterday.

Can somebody explain to me why Miami would want a 2nd round pick they will have no chance of ever getting?

Unless the Nets second round pick rolls over to 2011, why would Miami do this? To make it look good?

Stumped in Daytona Beach… where I’m freezing my butt off.

@Isaac
The Mets are the second most popular baseball team in Brooklyn and they make a lot of money, have a nice payroll and are among the three most valuable franchises in th MLB.

Perhaps in Kansas City, the Nets would be the most popular NBA team.

I’m confused, as usual. Will patrons of the arena be able to exit the subway/train from below the arena directly to the arena or will they have to come through the terminal and walk back to the arena?

After years of following this board, I was under the impression that the idea was to build the arena directly on top of the railway so that patrons could walk directly up to the arena.

What is Oder talking about with the whole rail station spitting people out in the wrong direction thing? Is he making a big deal out of nothing? Will it be difficult to get to Nets game from there? I mean, It couldn’t be rocket science, could it?

at Net Income:

Just like in your Jets/Giants Meadowlands vs Nets Meadowlands analysis, you are comparing APPLES TO ORANGES, no pun intended.

New York has ALWAYS been a two if not three team town in Baseball. When the Dodgers and Giants left (incidentally in part because Brooklyn wasn’t fully supporting its team) the city was BEGGING for another National League team because the Yankees were hated by half the city.

This is simply not the case with the Knicks or the NBA. As bad as the Knicks have been the last 10 years and as much as Dolan is disliked, the city remains loyal to the Knicks and outside of a percentage of people in Brooklyn (I wish I could give you the exact pct.) there is NO OTHER INTEREST for the Nets in New York City. So please stop comparing the NFL and MLB to the NBA – they are completely different beasts in the New York City landscape, and you of all people should realize this.

I hear the railroad entrance and exit will be at center court. The Nets hope all the commuters walking about might help out the defense. LOL

Isaac makes a good point. I guess once Proky and Ratner read his latest comment they will change their minds, and just stay in N.J. LMAO

Isaac you are way off. Do you know anything about Brooklyn and the area this stadium is being built?

at Mike: that is very funny except that Ratner and “Proky” could care less about how many fans the Nets have in Brooklyn which is why very little research on the subject has been performed (even low-level team execs would admit that to you). This is real estate, money-grab, basketball is inconsequential.

at burgerking:

yes I know plenty about Brooklyn, I lived there for most of my life. If they were building schools or affordable housing or libary, I would be ALL for it – that is exactly what the area could use more of. The Nets have not one but two arenas willing to host them in their home state, this proposal makes NO SENSE.

Do your really think that loyal Knick fans in Brooklyn will switch over to the Nets just because they play there?? Are you forgetting that the Knicks will be a major player this offseason? One thing i know about Brooklynites is that they are very stubborn and if they dont have the best team and a major name on thier team then they won’t support it.

Factor in the Long Island population and New Jersey/New Yorkers and should have more then enough potential customers.

Knick fans might even come just to give the Nets fans a hard time. Just like Yankee fans show up at Shea just to rub it in.

When the Mets are winning they hold their own against the Yankees in this town.
 
Around 1986 this was a Mets town, the Yanks where outside looking in… I know, I was there…

Put a good product out on the court and New Yorkers, the biggest jumpers on bandwagons the world has ever seen, will show up.

@Mike

“Can somebody explain to me why Miami would want a 2nd round pick they will have no chance of ever getting?”

I believe because NBA rules require that both sides in a trade get something. We are getting Quinn and the 2012 2nd rounder, and Miami is getting the conditional 2010 pick. In essence, Miami is giving us a 2012 2nd round pick to take Quinn (and his salary) off their hands. But NBA rules don’t allow the trade to be structured exactly that way – hence the 0.00000001% chance we end up with our 2010 pick as #51-60.

@Hex
A lot smarter people than you and I have done extensive marketing surveys on this subject and invested HUNDREDS of MILLIONS of dollars in the belief that they can make money. One of them is one of the richest people in the world. I think I will rely more his expertise than your opinion. Crazy as that may sound.

@Isaac
You are the expert in selling apples as oranges, not me.

@Ispartan
As part of the deal with ESDC and MTA, Ratner/Prokhorov will build passageways interconnecting the terminal, arena, subway and LIRR lines. The terminal will bring people in mainly from Long Island. The terminal will be, sometime in the future, the last stop between Manhattan and JFK on a high speed line. There are three transit hubs in the city, one around Penn Station, one downtown between the WTC and financial district and the Atlantic Terminal. Atlantic Terminal is the only one without high density development. THAT’s why it has been designated for urban renewal since the 1950’s.

@Andres
Correcto. I guess they are saving Drejer’s draft rights for the BIG deal. :-)

at net Income:

Once again you counter with an insult. How about addressing the facts I give you for once?

@Isaac
Not an insult, but that is a word you throw around willy-nilly. You have never provided facts. You provide spin.

I don’t even know if The Nets are the most popular team in New Jersey. Once the Nets sign Lebron, they’ll be the most popular team in the country.

The rennovation of the Atlantic Terminal has absouletely nothing to do with Ratner’s complex in any way or form. The MTA owns that station house even though Ratner ruined it after getting the air rights to build another subpar building of his on top of it. Also, it predates much of what’s around it including the WSB. It wasn’t even built with the intentions of the Dodgers playing there, so what makes any of you think that’s the case for the Nets. The only reason why the Atlantic Terminal is a transit hub is because the lines that cross there were be coincidence and the MTA always allowed for free transfers between subway lines that cross each other, though commuter rail lines are a different story. BTW, this station already sees the subways already beyond its normal capacity, and that’s without the arena being there.

Thank you A.S.

at Net Income:

“You have never provided facts. You provide spin.”

The following facts, instead of dismissing everything I say, PLEASE tell me of the following is not true:

1. The NFL and MLB are more popular in the NYC area than the NBA and therefore can easily support 2 teams in the area while doing so for the NBA and NHL for that matter are a stretch.

2. The Jets and Giants put 80,000 fans in the Meadowlands because the NFL is like religion around here and because both teams draw heavily from all of NYC, Long Island, New Jersey and part of CT while the Nets rely on Northern NJ for fan support over 41 home games including weeknights with hardly any public transportation or nearby dining options available. Football by nature has its fans commute by car (mostly on Sundays) and eating and drinking is done via tailgaiting in the parking lot by those driving customers.

3. New York City has always depended on a National League baseball team being available as an alternative to the Yankees and therefore the Yankees and Mets can both thrive with enormous fan bases.

4. For the past 50 or so years, people throughout New York City (which includes the borough of Brooklyn) have supported the New York Knicks through thick and then while the Nets whether they played on Long Island or in New Jersey were largely ignored or considered a laughingstock making it hard to believe they would all of a sudden have this huge following should they move to Brooklyn as you and several others seem to be envisioning.

NOW PLEASE – tell me exactly what part of what I just stated is NOT FACTUAL. I would love to hear this.

In other words, New York will support 2 football teams in East Rutherford, so there’s no way it will support 2 basketball teams at transportation hubs.

@ Isaac,

So you’re saying that the NY Yanks, NY Mets, NY Giants, NY Jets, and NY Knicks all do well, and the NJ Nets do not do well. I wish there was something to New JERSEY Nets could do that the New YORK Mets, New YORK Giants, New YORK Jets, New YORK Yankees, and New YORK Knicks all have in common. Who’s side are you on again?

I have already made me statement on the Mets in how their history was different from the Nets a while back when commenting on this site, so I will not repeat that again if you missed it the first time.

at net Income:

I’m still waiting. Exactly what that I presented above is NOT a fact???

@ Isaac:

1. is wrong. Football in ’64 when the Jets franchise (left the Polo Grounds for Shea) was NOT a religion in these parts. Yankee players like Mantle and Marris where MUCH bigger names than Giant stars like YA Tittle and Frank Gifford. And although the Giants were indeed the only team in town, no one was tailgating on 161st Street before Sunday kickoff.

Yet by ’65 the combo of a new stadium and new star, Joe Namath, made attendance levels almost equal for both teams. Again, this happened BEFORE football had turned into a religion and AFTER the city had spent the better part of 40 years supporting only one team.

By the late 60’s (after Superbowl III) and early 70’s w/the additions of John Riggins and Jerome Barkum the Jets were outdrawing the Giants. In fact until the Giants got their own new stadium and until Bill Parcells, Lawrence Taylor, Carl Banks and Phil Simms started winning, the Jets were probably the more popular of the two teams until well into the early 80’s.

The combo of the epic late season meltdowns and full season embarrassments during the Walton/Coslett/Carol/Kotite years, all while the Giants continued to win, and the abandonment of their Queens/Long Island fan base to instead, for all intent and purpose, become a tenant to the Giants, has since turned the Jets into the area’s 2nd team. That said, the area still supports both teams the way they will in hoops once the Nets move to Brooklyn.

The Nets in 2010 are a much bigger name than the Jets were in 1964. It only took the Jets about 5-6 years to match and later briefly overtake the Giants in terms of popularity. After that, it all depends on winning and keeping the fans happy.

1. 4 is wrong too. NYC has not supported the Knicks through thick and thin. In fact, for a few seasons in the early 80’s the Nets were outdrawing the Knicks. Also for a few seasons in the early 2000’s, Jason Kidd jerseys were outselling any Knick jersey. Imagine if those Kidd jerseys had the name “Brooklyn” on the front of them.

I do concede that Knicks attendance has not dropped all that much in 15 years but how much of that is corporate? Imagine how that changes when the Nets are just as close to Wall Street as the Knicks are.

Also, I think we can all agree that of the 4 major sports, NYC basketball fans are by far the least loyal. You’ll never find NYC hockey fans wearing Ovechken jerseys, or NYC baseball fans wearing Pujols jerseys, or NYC football fans wearing Peyton Manning jerseys, but a lot of them sure love Kobe. The same way a whole lot of them were supporting Jordan jerseys during an era when the Knicks were winning 55 games a year.

Minus the Willis Reed/Clyde Frazier era, the loyalty of Knick fans is as overrated as the dirty, cramped, bass drum arena that they play in. The Brooklyn Nets will own them just as the old Brooklyn Dodgers owned the old Manhattan Giants.

I’ll believe a new Nets arena there when I see it.

at BrooklynJohnny:

While I truly appreciate you taking the time to reply, unlike Net Income, I have to disagree with most of your points. Comapring the Jets in 1964 to the Nets in 2010 is not relevant. The Nets, unlike those those Jets have now had almost 40 years to make their mark on the greater NYC area and save for a few people here and there (like me) they haven’t. The fan base is almost exclusive built in Northern NJ and now if this moves happens almost all of those fans are GONE.

As far as your opinion that NBA fans are least loyal, I highly disagree. First of all, the NBA is a SUPERSTAR-based league, so of course you are going to see Kobe and LeBron fans. What do you think was going on in the 80s with Bird and Magic of of course in the 90s with Jordan? Those types of players are going to have band-wagon followers no matter how good the Knicks are. This does not take away from the fact that the Knicks are EASILY the most popular NBA team in NYC (which of course includes Brooklyn) despite the fact they haven’t fielded a legitmate team since the late 90s.

One thing we can agree on is that the Nets’ popularity was at an all-time high when Jason Kidd played here and the team was really on the verge of carving out a true niche for itslef in Jersey finally and on top of that had brand-new and nearly state of the art arena waiting for it while Kidd was still here and the team could still compete!!! Bruce Ratner ruined everything with this nightmare of his and now the team is not just the worst in the NBA but the worst in NBA history thanks to him!!! And here we are arguing if the team will even have a real fan base if it moves to Brooklyn when it is quite clear, it will not!!!

So once again thanks for your response, but please consider these facts because I am not making any of this up contrary to the belief of some.

What I did not include in my response above is that despite the immesnse popularity of Giants and Jets, it is NFL fans that are actually most likely to root for another team in the NYC area which only goes to show you ho football has indeed become religion around here, because both teams easily can get 80,000 for every game in East Rutherford. The Cowboys, Steelers and Dolphins all have known fan bases and local gatherings in NYC watering holes and to a lesser extent, so do the Viking, Raiders, 49ers and Bears have a contingent of fans in this area too. This simply does not occur in any other sport including the NBA (minus the Lakers, Celtics and Cavs due to their superstars and history.) Go door to door in NYC, you will find Knicks fan after Knicks fan among those still interested in this league, trust me on that one. That is not about to change unless, the Nets get LeBron at which point I will be the first to admit, all goes out the window and you will have the biggest band-wagon fan base in the history of professional sports. Nothing I would choose to be a part of.

@ Isaac:
Thanks for the nice words. I appreciate your response as well, although I do disagree. The Nets haven’t made their mark in this area (after 40 years) b/c they haven’t been playing in Brooklyn. Of course their fan base is almost exclusively in North Jersey, that’s b/c the play in North Jersey. The Islander fan base is almost exclusively on Long Island (as the Nets fan base once was) b/c, wait for it,,,, they play on Long Island.

Teams that play within the 5 boros (well, 4 at least) however are not regional like the Nets and Islanders. Instead, they garner attention from not just the city but the suburbs as well. Maybe North Jersey will no longer follow the Nets after a Brooklyn move, but when looking at how poorly they followed the Nets to begin with, who cares? Instead, look at all the fans that will be gained. Not just Brooklyn but also Queens, Long Island, and even some of the older ones from New Jersians as well.

As for loyalty, your words only further prove my point. Yes, I do remember seeing plenty of Bird and Magic jerseys here in the 80’s. Funny tho, I don’t remember seeing many wearing the jerseys of the superstars from those other leagues. Don’t recall too many Joe Montana, Wayne Gretzky, or Jose Canseco jerseys in these parts during that same era.

Until this season, attendance numbers actually speak differently in terms of the effects Bruce Ratner has had on the Nets. The Nets finished LAST in attendance during their first run to the finals. Towards the bottom of the league during their second run, and towards the bottom again in ‘04 (the year they lost in an epic 7 game series to the Pistons) when Ratner bought them, midseason. They’ve remained towards the bottom since Ratner bought the team but until 2007-08 they’ve actually been better than they were during their run to the finals.

I’ve posted this before, again, here are my facts on attendance:
http://www.apbr.org/attendance.html

(Oh and if you truly are originally from Brooklyn then you know that no self respecting Brooklynite would ever pick a Manhattan team over one of their own)

(Oh and if you truly are a former Brooklynite, I think you know that given an option the boro of Kings would not continue to root for a Manhattan team over one of their own.)

(Ooops, apologies for the double liner at the end. Thought it had disappeared the first time around.)

at Brooklyn Johnny:

A point about the attendance numbers several people (not just you) point to a lot on here. They are skewed. During the early part of this decade the team had a “no free tickets” policy. I have heard from team execs that EVEN THEY could not get freebies during this time period and therefore the attendance was below what it should have been when the team as great. Now, with the worst team in NBA history and management spitting in the faces of longtime fans, a large perecentage of the tickets are either free or on a huge discount and it has been this way for the past three seasons. I should know, I don’t buy tickets from the team anymore, and I have been paying 10-15 bucks for a pretty good during this time.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am not excusing the fan support during the brief glory years prior to Ratner, it should have been greater and I have always said those Kidd-led teams would have blown the roof off of MSG. But that point is moot, because the Nets are our team, the Knicks are New York’s team(this part of the true meaning of being a New Jersey Nets fan, lost on so many on here) and I still have some glimmer of hope that it would remain that way.

As to your point that I should root for the team if they moved to Brooklyn over the Knicks because i’m from Brooklyn and not Manhattan, you can forget about it. I would NEVER support this low-life fraud Ratner and now Prokorov if they steal the team away from us. I will either have to wait and pray that another NBA team eventually moves to Newark or basically just give up one one of my main enjoyments in life, which is the Nets and the NBA to a larger extent.

Isaac has never posted any numbers…it’s all his spin. No data, just his vaunted opinion.

I note by the way that Ratner is now including the new Terminal in his description of the larger Atlantic Yards project…and emphasizes the transit access it affords…to wit:

“The new arena is the centerpiece of the much larger future Atlantic Yards development which occupies 22-acres and includes 16 buildings for residential use, office, retail, community facilities, parking and public access spaces. The project also includes plans for reconfiguring and improving the Vanderbilt rail yard and upgrading access to the Atlantic Terminal subway station. The arena is set in a busy urban setting near the Atlantic Avenue-Pacific Street subway station and the Long Island Rail Road terminal in Brooklyn, one of the most transit-accessible locations in the New York City.”

Honestly, the MTA should worry about more important things such as making transit more efficient and expanding subway lines before thinking about rennovating or building new station houses. I find these nothing but pet projects. As a matter of fact they do just about nothing for transit. The only thing it will just give is just a new look but nothing else. BTW, this has nothing to do with the AY because that would have been done either way, though I think it was fine as it was.

This terminal was much needed. You don’t live in the arena why should you have a say on what is needed and not needed. The walk from this entrance to were the arena will be is a 5 minutes walk and plus they will be building another entrance when the arena is built.

The MTA is a state agency, not a city agency. In other word’s, it’s not just your taxes that went for this, but also mine. Therefore, I do have a say in this. Even the ESDC is a state agency, so I have every right to be involved there as well. Even if something involves something that is local, it doesn’t take a special insider to know about it, William. Boondoggles are boondoggles no matter where no matter when.