Surf’s Up For Anaheim
By VITA REED
Orange County basketball fans who don’t want a wallet hit the size of Shaquille O’Neal’s sneakers are getting a lower-cost option from a group of area businessmen.
The Southern California Surf of Anaheim, part of the American Basketball Association 2000 league, is set to play its first game Dec. 26 at the Anaheim Convention Center. Training camp started last week.
Surf officials said they are banking on an open playing style and affordability to lure supporters in OC and surrounding areas, including Long Beach, other parts of south Los Angeles County and the Inland Empire.
“You’re really looking at a market that borders on 9 million people,” said Stephen Chase, the Surf’s president and one of the team’s five owners.
But winning backers in OC,where most basketball fans root for the Los Angeles Lakers,won’t be a slam dunk for the Surf. The biggest challenge will be getting word out that the team even exists, and then creating a buzz around the games.
Surf co-owner George Argyros Jr., son of OC businessman, ambassador to Spain and former Seattle Mariners owner George Argyros, isn’t shy about his ambitions for the team: “We’ll be a first-class organization. We’re here to win.”
The Surf’s backers point to the National Basketball Association’s Los Angeles Clippers, which have drawn good crowds to their games at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim. And, earlier this year, Anaheim was mentioned as a suitor for the Vancouver Grizzlies, which eventually relocated to Memphis.
Surf ticket prices are set to range from $4 to $20 a game, with more than half of the convention center’s 7,700 seats going for $6 or less.
“We want to make it so that it will be less expensive for a family of four to come to a Surf game than to go to the movies,” Chase said.
Other Surf owners include: Chief Executive Mike Carroll, owner of Irvine-based Drummer Advertising; Chairman David Moore, chief executive of Anaheim-based Corinthian Colleges Inc.; and Ed Litwak, president of Del Mar-based Cavalcade of Sports Media Inc.
Team officials include former Los Angeles Laker star A.C. Green, who is vice president of basketball operations. Scott Brooks, a former University of California, Irvine, standout, is head coach.
Talks are ongoing to add women’s basketball pioneer Cheryl Miller as a special consultant, according to Chase.
The Surf’s backers hope to enlist business support for the team.
“It’s kind of a two-pronged effort where you need the sponsorship sales to be able to go out and market the team,” said Chase, a former Lakers marketing executive.
Corinthian Colleges is sponsoring the Surf’s halftime show. Other backers include Fountain Valley-based Hyundai Motor America and Lake Forest-based Biosport, a sports drink maker.
Other promotional plans include transit cards at bus shelters, advertising at 60 area car washes, a promotion with Pennysaver and spots in the Orange County Register, according to Carroll. The Surf also is in the process of putting a TV and radio package together, he said.
The Surf’s owners are touting the team as family friendly, citing pricing, early tip-off times and rules designed to keep games under two hours.
Regarding the Anaheim Convention Center, Chase said: “For our purposes right now, it is absolutely a perfect building. There is not a bad seat anywhere.”
Besides the Surf, other ABA 2000 teams include the Chicago Skyliners, Detroit Dogs, Kansas City Knights, Phoenix Eclipse and even the Tijuana Tazmanian Diablos.
Each ABA team is set to have 10 players, along with a $350,000 salary cap. Teams are set to play 42 games,half at home and half on the road.
In the ABA postseason, the top two teams in each division are set to face off with each other in a three-game playoff. From there, the winners advance to a three-game championship series.
The Surf and other ABA 2000 teams don’t see themselves as a minor league for the NBA, according to Chase.
“We actually are a licensee of the NBA,” he said, pointing out that the league had to obtain licensing rights from the NBA for the ABA name and league’s red, white and blue basketball.
The tricolor ball was the signature of the original ABA, which fielded teams from 1967 to 1976 and was the stage where NBA legend Julius “Dr. J” Erving, among others, made their names. Anaheim also had a team in the original ABA, the Amigos, which played in the 1967-68 season.
Chase worked for the ABA’s Kentucky Colonels at the time the original ABA merged with the NBA in 1976. Because the Colonels were not part of the merger, he moved to California and joined the Lakers in 1978.
“I got there the year before Magic (Johnson), and I was able to go along for a tremendous ride for the next 20 years,five NBA championships,” said Chase, who was vice president of sales and marketing for the team.
Chase left the Lakers in 1998 to go into the golf business, but said he was approached two years later by ABA 2000 officials about becoming a part of the new league.
