EPISODE 384: Basketball's Nomadic Nets - With Rick Laughland

March 2, 2025

Strap in and try to keep up, as we attempt to follow the peripatetic 58-year journey of one of the NBA's most wandering franchises - with New York-area sports beat reporter Rick Laughland ("A History of the Nets: From Teaneck to Brooklyn").

Today's Brooklyn Nets club began its life in 1967 as the New Jersey Americans - a charter member of the American Basketball Association, playing at the Teaneck Armory. A year later, they moved to Long Island (LI Arena, then Island Garden, then Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum) to become the New York Nets, winning two ABA championships (1974, 1976) behind superstar Julius Erving.

Absorbed into the NBA in 1976, the team struggled financially and was forced to sell Erving, leading to early-season struggles. In 1977, they relocated to the Garden State as the New Jersey Nets, playing at Rutgers Athletic Center (now Jersey Mike's Arena) before moving to Brendan Byrne (aka Meadowlands) Arena in 1981.

After almost becoming the "Swamp Dragons" in 1994, the early 2000s saw breakthrough success with Jason Kidd, Kenyon Martin, and Richard Jefferson - making back-to-back NBA Finals runs in 2002 and 2003.

Before a brief move to Newark's Prudential Center (2010–12), the team relocated to Brooklyn's purpose-built Barclays Center, with a complete franchise name, logo and color-scheme rebrand. Initially building around Deron Williams, they later pursued star power with Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce, followed by Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, and James Harden in 2019–2021.

Still bereft of an elusive NBA title, will the Nets continue to ply their trade in Brooklyn - or will they eventually return to their nomadic ways?

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A History of the Nets: From Teaneck to Brooklyn - buy here

EPISODE 372: "Banned" - With Michael Ray Richardson & Jake Uitti

December 1, 2024

Former NBA All-Star Michael Ray Richardson and his co-author Jacob Uitti (Banned: How I Squandered an All-Star NBA Career Before Finding My Redemption) join the show to discuss Richardson's riveting new memoir that chronicles his extraordinary journey on and off the basketball court.

Hailed as “the next Walt Frazier” coming out of the University of Montana as a first-round pick (fourth overall) in the 1978 NBA Draft, "Sugar" was a force to be reckoned with, leading the league in both assists and steals in just his second season - still New York Knicks team records to this day - and earning four All-Star appearances and two All-Defensive team honors. But behind the scenes, his career was overshadowed by personal struggles with drugs and alcohol, leading to a historic lifetime ban from the NBA in 1986 while a member of the New Jersey Nets.

Richardson shares how he rebounded from that moment, finding redemption through subsequent stints as a player and coach in places like the CBA (Albany Patroons, Oklahoma Cavalry); USBL (Long Island Knights); Premiere Basketball League; and a prolific 14-year professional league run in Europe, where he guided teams to championships and redefined his legacy.

Now running youth basketball clinics and reflecting on his journey, Richardson proves that resilience and accountability can turn even the darkest chapters into a comeback story.

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Banned: How I Squandered an All-Star NBA Career Before Finding My Redemption - buy here

EPISODE 289: The New Jersey Nets - With Łukasz Muniowski

January 15, 2023

We point our GPS towards the Garden State this week, for a return to the days of pro hoops in places like the "RAC" (Piscataway's Rutgers Athletic Center), the "Rock" (Newark's Prudential Center), and the strangely iconic Meadowlands - as we look back at 35 seasons of the oft-forgotten New Jersey incarnation of NBA basketball's peripatetic Nets franchise with sports historian Łukasz Muniowski ("Turnpike Team: A History of the New Jersey Nets, 1977-2012").

Though replete with memorable moments both before (as the inaugural American Basketball Association's New Jersey Americans, and later the twice-champion, Julius Erving-led, Nassau Coliseum-based New York Nets) - and after (as the thoroughly rebranded, Barclays Center-domiciled Brooklyn Nets, since 2012) - it is the club's time as the New Jersey Nets that stands out to fans and scribes alike as the most colorful, bewilderingly forlorn and oddly endearing period of its existence.

Join us for memories of players like Bernard "Sky B.B." King, "Super John" Williamson, Buck Williams, Sam Bowie, Derrick Coleman, Stephon Marbury, Jason Kidd, and Vince Carter - and a team that twice came this close to an NBA Finals championship (2001-02; 2002-03), unwittingly solidifying a decades-old inferiority complex that arguably still permeates the franchise today.

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Turnpike Team: A history of the New Jersey Nets - buy book here

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EPISODE #101: New York Yankees Broadcaster John Sterling

February 24, 2019

Legendary New York Yankees baseball play-by-play man John Sterling joins host Tim Hanlon for a cavalcade of career memories from his 50+ year journey in sports broadcasting – including a treasure trove of stops along the way with previously incarnated or otherwise defunct teams (and leagues).

Now celebrating his 30th consecutive season with the Bronx Bombers, Sterling’s unique vocal stylings have become synonymous with some of the Yankees’ most signature moments during that time – including the team’s dominant run of American League and World Series championships across the late 1990s and much of the 2000s.

The path to becoming one of baseball’s marquee team broadcasters was far from direct, however, and we (naturally) obsess over some of Sterling’s more memorable “forgotten” gigs along the way, including:

Falling into radio play-by-play with the NBA Baltimore Bullets as a late fill-in for Jim Karvellas;
Becoming the almost-voice of the ABA Washington Caps (until a hasty move to Virginia to become the Squires);
Hustling to secure radio rights to the upstart WHA New York Raiders for Gotham’s talk powerhouse WMCA - and the irony of later calling games for the NHL Islanders;
The highs of the ABA New York, and lows of the NBA New Jersey Nets;
“Phoning it in” for the World Football League’s short-lived New York Stars; AND
The ahead-of-its-time Enterprise Sports Radio Network.

Check out all the great “forgotten sports” garb and gear from our awesome sponsors: SportsHistoryCollectibles.com, Streaker Sports, OldSchoolShirts.com, and 503 Sports!

A History of the Nets: From Teaneck to Brooklyn - buy here

Banned: How I Squandered an All-Star NBA Career Before Finding My Redemption - buy here

Turnpike Team: A history of the New Jersey Nets - buy book here

Classic John Sterling audio clips courtesy of Eric Paddon; follow him on YouTube here