Tuesday, October 20th, 2009 at 9:00 am  |  47 responses

For $25K, Brook Lopez Will Come to Your House

by Marcel Mutoni

The reality of things is that most people don’t want to make the trek out to New Jersey to watch the wholly uninspiring Nets. Which is why the organization has to resort to these kinds of tacky moves in order to create buzz for itself. They have no other choice.

The Nets’ marketing team — God bless them — will do just about anything to get you to buy a ticket. In the summer, they made it clear that cheering for the opposition is more than encouraged (in fact, they’ll help you do it); now, for a large chunk of change, their players are not only required to play ball, but they’re also being made available for snot-nosed kids’ birthdays and bar mitzvahs.

The AP explains:

For $25,000, the Nets are offering four courtside tickets for 10 games, parking, access to a private lounge at the Izod Center with free food and beverages and something more — a one-hour appearance by a Nets player of your choice at your home, office, school or party.

“It will be interesting to have an NBA player come to your birthday party or come to your bar mitzvah or even just coming to your house for dinner for an hour when your friends are over,” Nets chief executive Brett Yormark said. “That’s a terrific thing and it’s tough to put a price tag on it.”

This promotion has the potential to fail in so many spectacular ways: Imagine some CEO, furious after yet another loss, forcing one of the Nets to show up at his office so he can get yelled at for an hour?

Naturally, the players will in no way be compensated for this service. New Jersey Nets basketball, everyone.

  • Add a Comment
  • Share
  • RSS

Tags: , ,

  • Jukai Posted: Oct.20 at 9:07 am
    F this, Ron Artest will do that all for free!

  • Z Posted: Oct.20 at 9:09 am
    disgusting.

  • Cheryl Posted: Oct.20 at 9:11 am
    Was this vetted through Stern’s office? This is just so tacky, I can’t imagine that David Stern signed off on this ish. Crazy!

  • Ken Posted: Oct.20 at 9:16 am
    Hilariously desperate. I love it. If anybody buys this package, they need to come up with something funny for the visit and video it.

  • Mo Charlo Posted: Oct.20 at 9:19 am
    How much does it cost to hang out with Mikhail?

  • Lori Posted: Oct.20 at 9:33 am
    I’m cringing after reading this. How low will the Nets go? “Daddy, can Devin Harris come over for Thanksgiving dinner this year?” “Why sure son, let me just give the Nets a call.”

  • Official Posted: Oct.20 at 9:44 am
    u can meet Michael Jordan at his basketball camp everysummer for $15,000.

  • Lu Galasso Posted: Oct.20 at 9:47 am
    This is amazing. I wouldn’t know who to invite though… I think it’d come down to Rafer or Najera.

  • Holy Baller Posted: Oct.20 at 9:52 am
    Sounds like a very expensive hooker……

  • Greg Tanner Posted: Oct.20 at 9:58 am
    This can’t be serious??

  • DW24 Posted: Oct.20 at 9:59 am
    How about you prank them, put it on Youtube, and end up on MTV pranked! Just don’t break anyones bones in the prank….well yeah you might as well break a bone so they don’t have to play for that team for a while.

  • Danny W UK Posted: Oct.20 at 10:10 am
    Wonder if Amaechi has $25k kicking around……….

  • iLL wiLL Posted: Oct.20 at 10:12 am
    To have Brook Lopez at your dinner table? Hilarious!

  • niQ Posted: Oct.20 at 10:33 am
    Definitely choose Rafer Alston. But, F that. I’m not paying 25K to chill with someone.

  • Yesse Posted: Oct.20 at 10:35 am
    Lol Brook Lopez for 25k?They should have atleast given that task to Devin Harris and Ron Artest has been doing all of that stuff for free now.Was this Jay-Z’s idea?I know he isnt that stupid.

  • la huey Posted: Oct.20 at 10:50 am
    @Holy Baller, i’d much rather go for the hooker.

  • Lori Posted: Oct.20 at 11:05 am
    For an extra 5K JayZ will mention your name in his next single..

  • rav Posted: Oct.20 at 11:08 am
    surely the players can tell the nets to do one if they try this – i know they have to do the odd marketing appearance in their contract but this is a bit extreme isnt it?

  • TC Posted: Oct.20 at 11:17 am
    For 25k, the whole cheer leading squad better show up in tight little bikini’s as well….

  • Spaceship Jay Posted: Oct.20 at 12:01 pm
    MMmmm, how whorish.

  • The D Train Posted: Oct.20 at 12:10 pm
    Holy crap, what a stroke of genius! If only the Jailblazers of yesteryear had this offer. I would have totally invited ‘Sheed over to my house to scream at relatives that I don’t much care for. Or maybe a night with Z-Bo if I had someone I needed sucker-punched. Oh snap…what about the old Warriors squad: “For 25K you too can have Latrell Sprewell come to your office to pay a nice visit to that boss that has been getting on your case lately.” Or maybe your a Rockets fan back around the late 90′s. Maybe there is some fat jagoff in the neighborhood that keeps mouthing off and being obnoxious towards you. NO PROBLEM! Just call throw down 25K to the Rockets and Vernon Maxwell shows up to learn that fat bastard a lesson.

  • RetepAdam Posted: Oct.20 at 12:11 pm
    The private lounge thing is nothing extra. Everyone sitting courtside can go to the Courtside Club for free food.

  • Greg Tanner Posted: Oct.20 at 12:28 pm
    LOL @ TC Word!

  • Russ Bengtson Posted: Oct.20 at 12:41 pm
    Can I buy Drazen Petrovic?

  • The D Train Posted: Oct.20 at 12:54 pm
    Do you think the Nets still have Dwayne Schintzius’s number? I’d love to have that guy come over to my house so I could watch him comb his ferocious mullet for an hour straight. Actually, I think that gives me an idea for my anniversary with my wife next year…(as an aside, does it royally piss off anyone else that Billy Ray Cyrus gets so much credit for having that grotesque mullet, but your average trasher doesn’t even know who Dwayne Schintzius is? seriously, google that dudes photos, you will NOT be disappointed…although you might be a bit queasy after)

  • Anton Posted: Oct.20 at 1:13 pm
    Honey, I just found a loophole in this offer. Beyonce’s coming to dinner.

  • underdog Posted: Oct.20 at 1:15 pm
    “It’s tough to put a price tag on it” – but they managed to put one on it, though.

  • Russ Bengtson Posted: Oct.20 at 1:23 pm
    *bets someone $100k they can’t beat me in a two-on-two with anyone they pick, hires Devin Harris as a ringer for $25k, uses profits to go to Disney World for three hours with Brook Lopez*

  • nicko Posted: Oct.20 at 1:27 pm
    join a frat for 600 a semester and you can chill with 400 more people

  • Young Chris MP3 Posted: Oct.20 at 1:36 pm
    Russ @ 1:23 wins it! And I think this is pretty cool.

  • Pimpin Posted: Oct.20 at 2:06 pm
    Pimpin ain’t easy….even the pro’s has to go through it, biaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaatch!

  • K3V1N3o5 Posted: Oct.20 at 2:54 pm
    How desperate does this look like,huh?

  • Russ Bengtson Posted: Oct.20 at 3:02 pm
    They’d probably have better luck charging people $25k to keep Brook Lopez from showing up at their house.

  • Russ Bengtson Posted: Oct.20 at 3:21 pm
    Although I suppose there are laws against things like that.

  • Russ Bengtson Posted: Oct.20 at 3:22 pm
    “Pay us $100k or we’re sending a drunken Jayson Williams to your house to do an ‘autograph signing.’”

  • Teddy-the-Bear Posted: Oct.20 at 3:43 pm
    This whole concept just seems ridiculous. Its like paying for a friend.
    Cool guys on the Nets though? I think hanging out with Skip and Devin Harris would be pretty cool.

  • The D Train Posted: Oct.20 at 4:56 pm
    oh man, Russ @ 3:22 slayed me…

  • The D Train Posted: Oct.20 at 4:58 pm
    if we throw in an extra $2.50 do you think the Nets could arrange for Robin to show up with Brook?

  • Chris Ujma Posted: Oct.20 at 6:08 pm
    …then the new Russian owner will send his ‘boys’ around to reclaim the 25k…..

  • Young C Posted: Oct.20 at 10:14 pm
    So for only $250,000 some rich bastard can have the Nets play 5 on 5 at the local YMCA for one hour?! Man the Nets are whores.

  • Mike Posted: Oct.21 at 1:05 am
    being a long time Nets fan, I’ve been through a lot, all the ups and downs. I was expecting this season to be a downer, and a hard time to sell tix, but this is just ridiculous…

  • Duncan21 Posted: Oct.21 at 2:59 am
    Can I have Lawrance Frank to show up at my house?

  • mat smith Posted: Oct.21 at 8:05 am
    sad

  • AB_40 Posted: Oct.21 at 8:10 am
    Yi is gonna be invited to a lot of chinese girls sweet 16 parties hahaha

  • ClydeSays Posted: Oct.21 at 1:41 pm
    Sheesh. All they have to do is move their games to Newark & they’ll increase tickets sales by at least 5-10k per game. I’d definitely go see some games there instead of taking a train to train to a bus to cab to get to the Swamp.

  • Big D Posted: Oct.21 at 2:30 pm
    I’ll pay the Nets $25,000 to ensure that Lopez doesn’t step within 300 yards of my home.

  • feelinit Posted: Oct.21 at 2:54 pm
    damn…how much for robin?

Comments




The comments section is a place to further discuss the topics in this post. Commenters who seek to accomplish any of the following may be banned: - Personally attack other commenters. - Make derogatory comments regarding race, ethnicity, language, gender, sexual orientation or religion. - Troll, or comment with the intention of creating problems. Trolling includes, but isn't limited to, baiting people to flame at you, encouraging people to leave the site, spamming and using alternate IDs.