Colonels' secret recipe for success

It was almost 15 years ago - I still have the framed proclamation on the wall in my study - that Martha Layne Collins, then the governor of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, officially commissioned me a Kentucky Colonel.

I was never quite certain what I'd done to merit this honour, other than cover a whole bunch of Kentucky Derbys. There was a time back in the era of Secretariat when I considered spending the first weekend of each May in Louisville essential to both my vocational and social schedules, but once I stopped drinking I learned that the Kentucky Derby quickly lost much of its charm.

As honoured as I was at the time to have been elevated to the social station of, for instance, Colonel Harlan Sanders of Kentucky Fried Chicken fame, my elation was short-lived.

"Congratulations," Colonel Billy Reed, the Kentucky newspaperman told me when I informed him of my new status.

"I don't know how to tell you this," added Colonel Reed, "but there are almost as many Kentucky Colonels as there are Chinese."

I hadn't thought much about it for several years, but a couple of weeks ago Ray Wooldridge, who owns the Charlotte Hornets, said he might move his team to Louisville next season. Kentucky Colonels seem to have been coming out of the woodwork ever since.

There used to be a basketball team called the Kentucky Colonels. They played in the late, lamented American Basketball Association (ABA), which merged with the National Basketball Association (NBA) a quarter-of-a-century ago - and we use the term "merged" advisedly here.

What actually happened was that the NBA (Gary Payton, a current player, is featured in the action shot below) merged with Julius Erving. The older league did take in four ABA franchises (the San Antonio Spurs, the Indiana Pacers, the Denver Nuggets and the then-New York Nets) and disbanded the rest, disbursing players, including Dr J, throughout the league.

At the time of the merger the Kentucky Colonels were owned by John Y Brown, a walking conflict of Colonelhood if ever there was one.

Not only was John Y a Kentucky Colonel himself, but he was later elected governor of Kentucky, in which office he was allowed to appoint other Kentucky Colonels. Moreover, Colonel Brown was the guy who had purchased Kentucky Fried Chicken from its founder, Colonel Sanders. He later sold it to a predecessor of Triton Global Restaurants, the current parent company.

At the time of the 1976 merger, Brown was paid a cool $3 million to fold his franchise and not join the NBA, money he would later use to purchase the Boston Celtics. During his brief reign, Brown did his level best to run that team into the ground as well.

The NBA, in any case, retained the rights to the Kentucky Colonels name, but allowed that trademark to expire in 1997. Since there was no longer a basketball team of that name, nor any obvious prospect of one arising, this appeared at the time to be a sound business decision.

Then last year, when the ownership of the Vancouver Grizzlies decided to pull up stakes and move south of the border, Louisville became its initial target. Far from an impediment to the process, the Kentucky Colonels handle actually served as a deal-sweetener. Included in Louisville's enticing proposal to the Grizzlies was a $100 million payment from Louisville-based Triton, the aforementioned heir to Colonel Sanders' Kentucky Fried Chicken chain, in return for naming the team the Colonels and the arena in which it would have played - we kid you not - the "KFC Bucket".

All of which sounded like a great deal, until the Grizzlies got an even better one from Memphis, which is where they now play. The issue would appear to have lain dormant, then, until word leaked out that Wooldridge was contemplating a move in which he might sidestep Triton altogether.

Now it develops that, back in March, when it was courting the Grizzlies, Triton applied to register "Kentucky Colonels" as a trademarked name, but they weren't alone. A family-owned Louisville costume shop called K S Caulfield, no doubt sniffing money wafting through the bourbon fumes, filed for a trademark with the US Patent and Trademark Office the same day.

The kick between the drumsticks is that neither of them may wind up with rights to "Kentucky Colonels". According to Bill Hollander, an attorney representing the Honourable Order of Kentucky Colonels, that organisation owns the common-law rights to the name.

The Charlotte team hasn't even applied for permission to move, but then they don't have to file that intention until March 1st of next year. And even if the Hornets relocate to Louisville, NBA deputy commissioner Russ Granik has already cautioned that the league's board of governors would have to approve any name change.

Triton and KFC are already on record as saying that if their claim is upheld, they will happily negotiate with Wooldridge, but what if it isn't? If I'm reading this right, and if David Stern really wants a team called the Kentucky Colonels in his league next year, he may have to negotiate with me!