The Summer Pro League, officially known as The Southern California Summer Pro League (SPL) is a basketball league held every summer in Long Beach, California where first and second round draft picks in the NBA are able to improve their skills. It is also a place where undrafted players are able to showcase their talents in hopes of garnering a spot on a pro basketball team. Since its inception in 1969, every NBA team has sent players to the league with over 800 players having participated in it.
The SPL moved to the Walter Pyramid on the campus of California State University, Long Beach in 1995. Before then, it was held at various sites in the Los Angeles Metropolitan Area, including UCLA, Loyola Marymount University, and Pepperdine University.
Notable alumni include Magic Johnson, Kobe Bryant, and many others.
In 2007, no NBA team sent players to the league. This was due to a conflict with the schedule of the adidas Vegas Summer League, at which 22 NBA teams participated. But Gino Kwok, one of the SPL's owners, told the Long Beach Press-Telegram that he hoped that NBA teams would return in 2008. Before '07, the last year without an NBA team in the SPL was 1998, during the league's extended lockout that summer.
Famous quotes containing the words summer, pro and/or league:
“Wind, the season-climate mixer,
In my Witches’ Weather Primer
Says, to make this Fall Elixir
First you let the summer simmer....”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“The upbeat lawyer/negotiator of preadolescence has become a real pro by now—cynical, shrewd, a tough cookie. You’re constantly embroiled in a match of wits. You’re exhausted.”
—Ron Taffel (20th century)
“Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward the Light Brigade!”
—Alfred Tennyson (1809–1892)