Cuban is bringing his Mavericks here
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Mark Cuban, the billionaire Mt. Lebanon native who wants to buy the Pirates, is making a business trip to Pittsburgh shortly after the conclusion of the baseball season. For Pirates fans, who would like for him to own the team, the business won't be baseball, however.
Cuban will bring the Dallas Mavericks, the team he owns, to Mellon Arena, Oct. 25, for an NBA exhibition game against the Cleveland Cavaliers.
Bringing his team -- and Cuban is more involved than any owner in professional sports -- to his hometown is something Cuban lobbied for, although it is a Cleveland home game.
"I definitely pushed for it," Cuban said in an e-mail response to questions.
The Cavaliers, who regularly play exhibition games in Pittsburgh, were all for it.
Len Komoroski, a Pittsburgh native who is the president of the Cavaliers, said, "From our end, we thought playing the Mavericks in Pittsburgh was a great idea and I'm sure he [Cuban] felt the same way. Not only are the Mavericks an attractive opponent, but they have a Mt. Lebanon native who owns the team."
Cuban will be there.
"I absolutely will be at the game," he wrote.
It's no accident the Cavaliers regularly play exhibition games in Pittsburgh.
"We've really worked to embrace Pittsburgh as part of our overall region," Komoroski said. "I know there is some sentiment that Pittsburgh is not an NBA town, but what we do know is there are a lot of NBA fans there.
"Western Pennsylvania fans buy nearly 10 percent of our single-game ticket sales. We have a decent number of season-ticket holders from Western Pennsylvania and we had group sales of over 10,000 from the area."
The game matches two of the best teams in the NBA. The Cavaliers, led by the NBA's most exciting star, LeBron James, advanced to the Eastern Conference semifinals and led Detroit three games to two before being eliminated. Dallas, the Western Conference champion, lost in the NBA Finals to Miami.
When Cleveland played last year at Mellon Arena against the Washington Wizards in a game that drew a crowd of 8,112, James did not dress because of a minor injury. But that game was early in the exhibition season. The game against Dallas will be the Cavaliers' final exhibition and comes a week before their season opener. That increases the chances of James playing.
Cuban, who was part of a group whose bid to buy the Penguins was rejected, was asked if bringing his team to Pittsburgh had anything to do with baseball.
"Actually, I was hoping it would be a perfect opportunity to push sales of Penguins tickets, but it didn't turn out that way. So it nets out that it's a chance for folks in Pittsburgh to come and check out some great NBA basketball."
First Published August 17, 2006 12:00 am
