(Bloomberg) -- Ice Cube’s 3-on-3 basketball league, the Big3, is pitching to investors as it moves from a touring format to a city-based model.
The Big3 is in talks with basketball legend Julius Erving to bring a team to Philadelphia, and is also in contact with hall-of-famer Dominique Wilkins to potentially come to Birmingham, Alabama, according to people with knowledge of the matter who asked not to be identified discussing private deliberations.
Terms haven’t been finalized and negotiations may still fall through. A representative for the Big3 declined to comment on the status of negotiations.
Ice Cube, which is the stage name for actor and musician O’Shea Jackson, and his business partner Jeff Kwatinetz are pitching global expansion to potential investors, according to a pitch deck reviewed by Bloomberg, citing the potential for international tours, exhibition matches and teams. They’re also looking to create content such as podcasts and documentary series.
The Big3 attracts more than 10,000 fans on average to its weekly events, according to attendance figures in the pitch deck. Games aired on CBS draw about 455,000 viewers. That’s less than a third of the average number of viewers for National Basketball Association games, but still impressive for a startup league.
The Big3 sold its first team, located in Los Angeles, in May in a deal worth $10 million. Since then, it has added more owners with squads based in Houston, Miami and Detroit.
The league, now in its offseason, currently operates teams that aren’t linked to any city and travel around the country for weekly events, but that is poised to change for the 2025 season.
Formed in 2017, the teams — with names like the 3 Headed Monsters and Ball Hogs — had been owned and operated by the league until the deals earlier this year. The Big3 hopes to expand to 16 teams, up from the 12 it currently has, and have all sold by summer 2025.
Discussions are ongoing for many other cities to host teams, including the Washington DC area, Boston, Nashville, Tampa, Jacksonville, Cincinnati, Louisville, Charlotte, and Virginia Beach, the people said. There are also talks for teams in Raleigh, Pittsburgh, Newark, Kansas City/St. Louis and the San Antonio/Austin area. Two international cities — London and Toronto — have also been brought up.
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