Sporting his finest Sunday attire.

That’s right, Dennis Rodman retired (for now) from his two game coaching career, undefeated.  Oddly enough Rodman coached the Elmira Bulldogs of the Eastern Basketball Alliance to victories over the New York Wizards in one of the games (both teams are now 7-1).  This move was obviously a marketing ploy for the EBA which I had no idea even existed.  Dennis Rodman (who is probably broke, just a guess) was paid $40,000 per contest and Charles Berch, the operations of basketball manager at Elmira, was hoping Rodman would draw a large crowd to bring in more revenue.  Berch couldn’t have been anymore wrong.

In the two games Rodman was coach the fans poured into the seats at a combined 600 people!  What!  Rodman drew 250 fans the first game and 350 fans the second game.  Elmira would have had to have charged over $130 per ticket to break even on what they paid Rodman.  I’d have to say that were unsucessful at accomplishing that feat.  I sort of feel bad for the Elmira Bulldogs, certainly not for Rodman.  I would gladly take $40,000 right now to coach an EBA team for the entire season!  I wonder if they would make money then?

I mean just read this quote and you will likely feel bad for Berch and the Bulldogs too, 

“We got two wins, but at a huge price,” Berch said. “We tried to do this because we were trying to get the team on better financial ground, but it backfired on us. The community and the city did not support this event. I’m beginning to think maybe they are not into basketball. Maybe it is just a hockey town.”

He later went on to say, “It’s going to be a miracle making it through the season.”  WOW.

All the players were appreciative of Rodman’s coaching saying he did a good job, but please Dennis, for the love of the Elmira Bulldogs, donate that money back to the team!

-The Basher