By Neil Schmidt
The Cincinnati Enquirer

In the last decade, Cincinnati has become a graveyard for minor-league teams.

The Cyclones in hockey. The Cincinnati Stuff and Kentucky ProCats in basketball. The Rockers and Swarm in arena football. The Silverbacks, Riverhawks and TC Stars in soccer.

Which led to this question at the inaugural news conference for the Cincinnati Blaze:

What makes you think you'll be different?

The answer will have to be in its approach. With the announcement Wednesday of its team name, logo and home - U.S. Bank Arena - the burden will be on this American Basketball Association team to perform better in the next six months than in the season that follows.

"I've learned you couldn't start (marketing) a month before the season," said coach and general manager Ralph Underhill, referring to the lateness of his appointment when coaching the ProCats.

"This is the way to do it. We've got six months and can have a marketing blitz, really get people interested."

U.S. Bank Arena lost both anchor tenants this year when the Swarm and Cyclones each discontinued operations. It had seen basketball fail before, when the Stuff of the International Basketball League folded in 2001 after two seasons.

The Blaze, approved as an ABA expansion team earlier this month, will be the fifth professional basketball team in the area. The NBA Royals played 15 seasons (1957-72) at Cincinnati Gardens, and the Continental Basketball Association's Slammers played two seasons in the 1980s at the Gardens. The ABA's ProCats, based at Thomas More College, folded after one year when the league took a break for the 2002-03 season.

Yet the ABA is back in a potentially more viable form. The league, which had seven teams last year, has 28 teams for the coming season. It also has instituted a $120,000 salary cap, eliminating the overspending scenarios that had gotten the league imbalanced.

The idea is simple: Keep costs low so teams can break even. With divisional foes expected to include Louisville, Nashville, Detroit, Pittsburgh and Hershey, Pa., the Blaze can save money by busing. (The ProCats had numerous plane trips.)

The ownership group of local businesswomen Sonseeahray "Sunny" Ross-Bigbee, Culpatrice Foster and Marlene Ditto spoke of strong community involvement, including players speaking in schools and a "Little Blazers" youth league that includes team camps and mentoring by players. The team expects to suit up some players from area colleges.

Yet what is most critical is salesmanship. Underhill, best known for his 18 seasons coaching at Wright State, said season-ticket sales and corporate sponsorship would decide the franchise's fate.

Ross-Bigbee said the owners hope for an average attendance between 3,000 and 5,000.

Underhill's assistants will be Steve Moore, who coached at Oak Hills, Beechwood and Summit Country Day high schools and assisted with the ProCats; and Tom Thacker, a University of Cincinnati great and former Slammers coach.

The ABA has that familiar red-white-and-blue ball. It is now also notable for a rules quirk called the "3D" - if a team steals the ball in the backcourt and scores on the ensuing possession, it gets three points for a two-point shot and four for a 3-pointer.

E-mail nschmidt@enquirer.com