Maloof Brothers Like To Swear, Exploit Casual Basketball Fans
The Miami Heat visited Sacramento for the only time this season on Saturday night. I don't mean that strictly in a basketball sense: I can pretty much guarantee none of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade or Chris Bosh will step foot in Sacramento at any point until next season's road game against the Kings; they chose South Beach for a reason, folks, and the only thing Sactown has in common with Miami is a lot of sunshine.
The Maloof brothers, owners of the Kings, milked that visit for all it was worth, jacking up ticket prices as a part of its new dynamic pricing system. Did it work?
The game, a Heat blow-out (shocking!), didn’t actually sell out; the arena got to about 94 percent of capacity. But that doesn’t mean the Maloofs failed to profit heavily from Pat Riley’s coup. FOXSports’ Bill Reiter hung out with the Maloofs during the game, and culled this quote.
This game is huge -- huge for Sacramento, huge for the NBA, as every Heat game is for every city when their day arrives. This is the biggest gate the Kings have had in a regular-season game since the Maloofs bought the team 11 years ago, including their glory days earlier this decade.
"Oh yeah, this is good for business," Gavin Maloof tells me later. "This gate will be two-and-a-half times our normal gate. Usually, the Lakers are the better draw. Not tonight."
Given the attendance figure, that means the Kings earned their big gate off the backs of fans who wouldn’t turn out for most games. Whether those are casual Kings fans or locals who just want to see the spectacle of LeBron & Co., it doesn’t matter. They were willing to pay the inflated ticket prices to share the arena with the bleedin’ purple Kings faithful who show up no matter who is dressing in the opponents’ locker room.
All that stuff isn’t the most interesting part of Reiter’s excellent dispatch, though. As it turns out, the Maloofs are great fun during a game -- as much fun as your normal, everyday bleacher bum.
“Get that s*** out of here LeBron!”
Gavin is fired the hell up.
“GET IT OUT OF HERE LEBRON!”
He hasn’t let up as the first quarter has gotten under way, and he won’t, not all night, not for a moment, not one godd*** second.
“We sweat every dribble,” Joe, Gavin’s older brother, says. “Every shot, every dribble, every play.”
This goes on much of the story: Gavin calls Mario Chalmers a "lucky son-of-a-b---h," implores the referee to call a tech on LeBron (the officials eventually comply) and screams across the court at Kings coach Paul Westphal to let rookie DeMarcus Cousins stay in the game with two fouls (Westphal does not comply). It's a rollicking read, and the best P.R. the embattled (due to the Kings' league-low salary) Maloofs could buy.
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