NBA's New Jersey Nets File Paperwork to Change Team's Name in 2012

The New Jersey Nets and owner Mikhail Prohkorov have begun the application process for changing the team’s name.

Nets spokesman Barry Baum said today the team filed paperwork with the National Basketball Association earlier this week. If accepted, the change would become official before the 2012-13 season, when the Nets plan to move to Brooklyn’s new Barclays Center.

WHAT IS THE ALFA GROUP CONSORTIUM? Mikhail Fridman (source Alfa Group)

Founded in 1989, Alfa Group Consortium is one of Russia’s largest privately owned financial-industrial conglomerates, with interests in oil and gas, commercial and investment banking, asset management, insurance, retail trade, telecommunications, media, water supply and water disposal, as well as other industrial-trade and special-situation investments. The Group typically focuses on value-oriented, longer-term opportunities, primarily in Russia and the CIS, but also invests in other markets which form part of the Group’s strategic business objectives.