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Quick facts: Founded: 1923 Arena: Power Balance Pavillion Division Championships: 5 NBA Titles: 1(1951) NBL Titles: 1(1946) Playoffs: 29 Best Season 61-21 2001-02 Best win % Season .750 45-15 1948-49 .750 51-17 1949-50 Worst Season 17-65 2008-09 Worst win % season .207 2008-09Nickname History:
The Kings are the old professional American basketball team still in existence, having been formed in 1923. Since 1923 the franchise has relocated five times, the most in NBA history, and has had four different nicknames.
Originally called the Rochester Seagrams; they were named for the Seagrams distillery in Rochester. The team remained the Seagrams until 1943 when they became the Eber Seagram Pros for one season. The following season they became just the Rochester Pros.
The reason for the name change from Seagrams to Pro's was because Rochester wanted to become a dry county.
In 1945 the team joined the NBL and had to find a new name since all the teams in the league were professionals or pros. The team went back to its drinking heritage when it joined the NBL. Seagrams was also known as Canadian Royal Whiskey, so Royals was taken to pay homage to the teams history. The team remained the Royals through their most success years in Rochester and even on to Cincinnati where they moved in 1957.
The team relocated again in 1972 and played their games between Kansas City, Missouri and Omaha, Nebraska. Because Kansas City already had a team named the Royals the current Royals were forced to change their name. They selected Kings due to its closeness to Royals. The Kings have kept the nickname since 1972 taking it with them to Kansa City after the dropped Omaha and than on to Sacramento.
Oldest NBA Team:
The Kings are the oldest NBA team, and are probably the oldest continually operated basketball team in the world. The Kings got their start in 1923 as the Rochester Seagrams. The Seagrams were a coperate sponsored team and were owned and coached by Les Harrison.
The Seagrams primarily were an independant barnstorming team who would play games against other corperate teams. The Seagrams were successful both on and off the court - being one of the few teams of the 1920s to turn a profit.
In 1932 the Seagrams were forced to join the District Basketball Association due to the Great Depression. The revenue sharing program of this early league allowed it and the Seagrams to stay afloat.
The Seagrams again went independent in 1936 after failing to join the ABL and MWC.
In 1943 the Seagrams merged with another team to become the Rochester Pro's. Mergers at this time where common place as most young men were off fighting in World War II.
As the Second World War ended the Pros changed their name to the Rochester Royals and were accepted into the National Basketball League. The NBL was the premier basketball league in the world and the Royals dominated winning the NBL title the first year in the league. The Royals played 3 dominate years in the NBL before the upstart BAA offered them a spot.
The BAA had bigger cities and more financial backing and was trying to take down the NBL, so the move was a logical one for the Royals. The Royals did very well in the BAA winning 15 games their first year before losing to Minneapolis in the playoffs.
The next season the BAA merged with the NBL to form the NBA.
Diversity:
Team History:
The 1920s and 30s were an incredibly hard time to operate a basketball team. In these decades, and even into the 1940s and 1950s, most franchises were expected to last only 2 or 3 seasons before folding. However, because of the sponsorship of Seagrams distillery, the Seagrams were able to stay afloat financially while most their competitors disbanded. This is why the Seagrams never joined a league. Most leagues were shakier than most the individual teams, and by barnstorming the Seagrams could earn more money.
This all changed in 1945 when the most talented players started opting for the NBL rather than the independent circuit. This forced the Seagrams to become the Royals and join the NBL.
The NBL years are some of the best in franchise history. The first year after joining the league the Royals won the title, and in their next two seasons they made the finals both times. The following year the Royals moved to the BAA and lost in the west finals.
The BAA and NBL would merge in 1949 and the Royals would continue to see success, including winning another title in 1951. This success was short lived as the franchise began a downward spiral for which it never really have overcome.
The Royals seen some success in the early 1960s behind Oscar Robertson and Jack Twyman while in Cincinnati, but never won anything of significance. Since the end of the Royals era, which last from 45 until 1955, team has won only 3 division titles (79,02,03), has only won 50 or more games 5 times (64, 01-05) and only made the playoffs 22 times in 60 seasons and have advance beyond the first round 9 times.
Most of the Kings success after the Royals era was in the early 2000s. From 1998-2006 the Kings made the playoffs every season, their longest streak in franchise history, and won 5 playoff series. The franchise in its history has only won 14 playoff series title, so the 5 series wins, all coming between 01 and 04, is highly important. The Kings had a real shot at making the finals in 2002 but lost in 7 games to the Los Angeles Lakers in a very controversial Western Conference Finals series which many fans feel that they were cheated out of a shot at the title.
Since 2006 the Kings have been abysmal, having not had a winning record and having undergone roster rebuild after roster rebuild. A new ownership change a new arena, which is under construction, and the efforts of former NBA all-star and Sacramento mayor Kevin Johnson will keep the team in Sacramento for the foreseeable future and hopefully improve the franchises fortunes.
On the Move:
But inbetween those real moves, the Kings franchise has had several almost moved. Going as far back as the 1930s, owner Les Harrison sought to move his team to Buffalo, or Albany. When the Royals were looking for a new home in the 1950s they considered moving to Buffalo, Toronto, or New York City. In the 1970s they considered moving to Salt Lake City. In the 1980s before settling upson Sacramento the team looked into moving to New Orleans or Minneapolis.
The relocation talk hit an all-time high in the 2010s as the city of Sacramento struggled to build a suitable home for the team. Seattle, Virginia Beach, Las Vegas and Anaheim all had serious bids for the Kings, but ultimately it was former Phoenix Suns guard and Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson who helped keep the team in California's capitol city.
The NBA began in 1946 as the BAA, this is a fact most fans know. But what many fans do not know is that some of the leagues teams predate the formation of the NBA.
Only three of the original 11 teams are still in existence today. The 1946-1947 had many teams fans are familiar today, they include: The Boston Celtics, New York Knicks, and Philadelphia Warriors. Those are the 3 oldest purely NBA teams, but what often gets left out of NBA history is the history of other leagues besides the NBA, most notable the NBL.
The National Basketball League or NBL was a league born out of other Midwest leagues in the mid 1930s. The League was able to survive the Great Depression and World War II before it finally merged with the BAA to form the NBA. The NBA pretty much washed away the NBL's history and the history of the teams who joined.
Still, most NBL and BAA teams from before 1960 did not make it. Of the 18 teams who were in the NBA during the 1949-50 season, only the Celtics, Knicks, Warriors, Minneapolis Lakers, Syracuse Nationals, Rochester Royals, Tri-Cities Blackhawks, and Fort Wayne Pistons are still around today. And there you have it, the oldest 8 teams in NBA history. But the age of a team does not tell its history, and in some cases a teams history goes way-way back.
So here we go, the 10 oldest teams in the NBA.
Losing is as much a part of basketball as winning, but some teams do the former a lot more often than the latter. They lose so much that they become synonymous with losing. The Clippers have been the butt of many jokes, especially during the 1990s, about their winning futility, but they seem to have turned it around once being sold off.
So who is the worst team in NBA history? Obviously, the Los Angeles Clippers come to mind first and foremost. This is a franchise that all but embraced losing and made it part of their identity. But a forced ownership change has seemingly given the Clippers a new identity that has taken them away from the trash heap of the NBA. The glitz and the glam of LA also added to the Clippers mystic as the unlovable losers, and the franchise did deserve a lot of the bashing it got for sucking.
The Clippers were run by a terrible owner in Donald Sterling and had a terrible general manager in Elgin Baylor, that Sterling insisted on keep even though the team was always terrible
Sometimes a game can seem like it never ends. The last two minutes of a game can take thirty minutes in real life minutes, but the game usually ends in regulation and occasionally goes into overtime. But on January 6, 1951 it seemed like a game between the Indianapolis Olympians and Rochester Royals would never end.
On May 5, 2019 the Portland Trailblazers outlasted the Denver Nuggets 140-137 in four overtime, but that game would pail in comparison to the January 6th game. On that cold night in Rochester the Olympians beat the Royals 75-73, in SIX OVERTIMES!
The six overtime periods is still a record for the NBA. The game broke the record set a year earlier when the Syracuse Nationals outlasted the Anderson Packers in five overtimes. The NBA was still in its infancy at the time
The 1970s were a interesting decade for America and for sports in particular. The decade saw the US withdraw from Vietnam and seen the presidency mired in the biggest scandal in American history; Watergate. It saw the Superbowl rise to dominance lead by the dominant teams of the era, the Steelers and Cowboys and it seen the Miami Dolphins deliver the only perfect season. In the basketball world it seen the NBA go head-to-head with the dazzling ABA only to see the larger NBA eat the ABA and take four of its teams.
It was also an era in the NBA when the annual NBA draft was like that annoying song from the children's show Lambchop; it would go on and on and on..... But looking at the seemingly endless list of picks and one can find some funny and interesting picks. The Chicago Bulls would draft runner Carl Lewis in 1984, the same year they drafted a guy named Michael Jordan. The New Orleans Jazz drafted a woman named Lusia Harris. The Boston Celtics drafted a water boy and the Lakers tried drafting both Scooby Doo and a chair but both picks were rejected by the league. But one of the most interesting publicity stunt picks, mostly because he may have actually been able to play in the NBA, was the Kansas City Kings 7th round pick Bruce Jenner.
The Kings franchise has always been on the forfront of diversity. They where one of the few barnstorming teams of the 1920s and 1930s to have black players. In the 1920s Les Harrison and the Seagrams sponsored one of the first women's teams, which sadly lasted all of 2 games and 1 day.
The Kings have had one of the roughest roads in the NBA. The lack of success has been a problem that has plagued this franchise since the merger of the NBL and BAA in 1949. Before the merger the Seagrams were one of the most successful teams in all of basketball.
One thing that has been a constant issue with the Kings is their inability to stay in a location. The team was in Rochester from 1923 until 1957, than moved to Cincinnati from 1957-1972. The Royals rolcated and split games between Kansas City, Missouri and Omaha, Nebrasksa, from 1972-1975 and than played full time in Kansas City from 1975-1985 before moving to Sacramento.
The Kings where called the Seagrams from 1923-1942
Rochester Pro's 1943
Game advertisement from a Royals vs Pistons game in most likely 1945. The game is one of the first examples of the NBL trying to branch out into new markets. The game was played in Toronto, ON. The Midwest Basketball Conference, a precursor to the NBL, did have a team in Windsor, Ontario, which is just across the river from Detroit.
Bob Davies goes for a layup vs the Jeeps
1945-46 NBL Champion Rochester Royals
46-47 Royals
1951 Royals
1955-56 Year Book.
1956-57 Royals
Wilt Chamberlain and Jack Twyman laugh with Maurice Stokes
Oscar Robertson 1966
Oscar Robertson vs the Bullets.
Ben McLemore drives past the jazz
Mitch Richmond celebrates all-star MVP
Sim Bhullar makes history as the first Indian NBA basketball player
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