| Baltimore Bayrunners | |
|---|---|
 | |
| League | IBL |
| Founded | 1999 |
| Folded | 2000 |
| Arena | Baltimore Arena |
| Location | Baltimore, Maryland |
| Team colors | blue, navy, dark green, grey |
| Website | www.iblhoops.com/teams/bayrunners (archived on March 11, 2000) |
The Baltimore Bayrunners were a professional basketball team in the International Basketball League (IBL) from 1999 to 2000. [1] The Bayrunners were the first professional basketball team in Baltimore, Maryland since the Bullets re-located to Washington, D.C. in 1973. The Memphis franchise of the former American Basketball Association had intended to move to Baltimore for what turned out to be that league's final season, 1975–76, but then folded without playing a game in Baltimore. The Bayrunners were owned in-part by Baltimore Orioles third baseman Cal Ripken. [2]
The International Basketball League (IBL) was a short-lived professional men's basketball league in the United States. The IBL was headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland. The league started in 1999 and ended in 2001.
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball through the defender's hoop while preventing the opposing team from shooting through their own hoop. A field goal is worth two points, unless made from behind the three-point line, when it is worth three. After a foul, timed play stops and the player fouled or designated to shoot a technical foul is given one or more one-point free throws. The team with the most points at the end of the game wins, but if regulation play expires with the score tied, an additional period of play (overtime) is mandated.
Baltimore is an independent city in the state of Maryland within the United States. Baltimore was established by the Constitution of Maryland as an independent city in 1729. With a population of 611,648 in 2017, Baltimore is the largest such independent city in the United States. As of 2017, the population of the Baltimore metropolitan area was estimated to be just under 2.808 million, making it the 20th largest metropolitan area in the country. Baltimore is located about 40 miles (60 km) northeast of Washington, D.C., making it a principal city in the Washington-Baltimore combined statistical area (CSA), the fourth-largest CSA in the nation, with a calculated 2017 population of 9,764,315.
The Bayrunners played in the 1st Mariner Arena (formerly the Baltimore Arena). The Bayrunners were a charter member of the IBL but lasted only one of the league's two seasons and were not in existence when the surviving IBL teams merged with teams that had moved over to it from the defunct Continental Basketball Association to form a revitalized CBA. [3]
The Continental Basketball Association (CBA) was a professional men's basketball minor league in the United States. For most of its existence the CBA was the second-tier of men's professional basketball in the United States behind the National Basketball Association (NBA). The NBA formed a working agreement to develop players and referees in the CBA during the 1980s. Until the NBA formed the National Basketball Development League in 2001, the CBA served as the official minor league to the NBA.
