Second Annual Cam Newton 7 v 7 Football Tournament June 26-27; Championship July 11-12

The Cam Newton Foundation brings its Second Annual 7 v 7 High School Football Tournament to Charlotte this week, June 26 and 27. The tournament series began at the end of last month in Atlanta, then went on to Birmingham, and now it's Charlotte's turn, with the games taking place at Hough High School. It's open to the public to attend, admission is $3 per person, and proceeds will benefit the Cam Newton Foundation. So, this is your chance to see some of the area's best high school football players compete, while supporting a foundation that does a lot to aid and lead youth programs in Charlotte (where Cam lives and plays for the Carolina Panthers) and in Atlanta (his hometown).

Cam Newton performs drills with high school players at last year's Charlotte tournament.
Photos credit: Cam Newton Foundation

Each city features several teams of high school players that registered weeks in advance (teams consist of up to 20 players and four coaches), and--new this year--the top two teams from each city, along with select others, will play in the CNF 7v7 championship on July 11 and 12 at Nation Ford High School, just across the Charlotte border in Fort Mill.

Hough High won the Charlotte tournament last year, receiving $2,500 for the school's athletic department, and the second- and third-place finishers received $1,500 and $1,000 respectively. Team trophies and individual awards were also given.

Below is a short video recap from last year's Charlotte tournament, at which Cam was actively involved. "I wanna see unbelievable talent, I wanna see unbelievable sportsmanship, and I wanna see unbelievable swag," said the Panthers' star quarterback.

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What's In the Box? Charlotte Knights Unveil New Team Colors, Logo, and Merchandise

If you follow the Charlotte Knights on Twitter, and happened to see the team's feed today, you were probably asking: What's in the box? (Though you likely didn't drop the F-bomb.)

The Charlotte Knights promotions department came up with a clever, social media-powered strategy to generate interest leading up to the team's big announcement this evening, as well as to tie-in with the Triple-A club's move from Fort Mill to the new Uptown Charlotte baseball stadium. Below are several of the photos the team posted to its Twitter account today, beginning around noon and continuing until tonight.

Photos credit: @KnightsBaseball

So as you see, the Knights have debuted a new team logo and colors. The new designs and merchandise were formally unveiled during an event this evening at the Charlotte Convention Center. Here's how the look is described in the announcement on the team's website:

"In keeping with a medieval theme, the Knights new image showcases gold and silver, colors synonymous with royalty. The team's four on-field caps feature a base color of black with white accents, creating a classic combination of colors unique within Minor League Baseball. The font-style in the team's word emblem "Knights" has an Olde English look similar to professional baseball's Charlotte Hornets circa 1950."

Below is a look at the old logo against the new logo (in case you're wondering, it's already been updated on Wikipedia).

I must say, I like the new look. It looks fiercer, which is what I prefer in sports teams' branding. The Knights hired Brandiose, a San Diego-based design firm to create the new look. Brandiose has designed new identities for minor league and major league teams.

This new look will certainly add to the excitement for what's already an exciting time for the team (don't forget they added their first-ever cheerleader squad, The KnightinGals, last spring), led by its move to the under-construction BB&T Ballpark in Uptown. The stadium is scheduled to be completed in time for the Knights to begin playing there at the start of the 2014 season. Their home opener is Friday, April 11, at 7:05 p.m.

BB&T Ballpark rendering. Credit: charlotteknightsatuptown.com

Keep up with all things Charlotte Knights by visiting charlotteknights.com.

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Name the Charlotte Knights Dance Team

UPDATE 4/12/13: The dance team has been named The KnightinGals (video).

For the first time ever, the Charlotte Knights have a dance team (cheerleaders). The group of ladies debuted last weekend during the Triple-A baseball team's annual fan event, Knights Fest. Now, team officials are asking you to name the dance team.

To help with your brainstorming, consider the names of Charlotte's other professional sports dance teams/cheerleaders. The Carolina Panthers (NFL) have the TopCats; the Charlotte Bobcats (NBA) have the LadyCats; and the Charlotte Checkers (AHL) have the CheckMates. Quick side note: someone should organize an annual beauty pageant in which our city's professional cheerleaders compete. I'd pay to see that (swimsuit competition).

The Charlotte Knights dance team. Credit: Facebook

Back to the issue at hand, what do you think the Charlotte Knights dance team should be named? My suggestion is "Ladies of the Knight." Provocative, I know. Well, you're encouraged to email your suggestions to Media Relations Director Tommy Viola at tommyv@charlotteknights.com. Entries must be received by Tuesday, April 9 at 5 p.m. The winning name will be revealed at the Knights' opening day, Thursday, April 11, during the dance team's pre-game performance.

The Knights dance team is scheduled to perform at 11 home games this season:

Thursday, April 11
Saturday, April 20
Saturday, April 27
Saturday, May 11
Saturday, June 1
Saturday, June 15
Saturday, June 29
Saturday, July 6
Saturday, July 27
Saturday, August 17
Saturday, August 31

As you likely know, the Knights are currently playing their final season at their stadium in Fort Mill, where they've played since 1990. The team's future home will be in Charlotte proper, when the brand-spanking new BB&T Ballpark opens in Uptown next spring.

For more details on the Knights' 2013 season, visit charlotteknights.com.

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Gamecock Fan Fest Tour Kicks Off Wednesday at Charlotte Knights Stadium

My email inbox has been getting flooded with events lately as it seems like this is the time of year when so much is going on. Sometimes it can be hard to keep up with. But I was delighted when I received an email reminder today from the USC Charlotte Gamecock Club about the Gamecock Fan Fest Tour. The tour kicks off this Wednesday, May 11 at Charlotte Knights Stadium in Fort Mill, and is traveling across the state of South Carolina to promote the 2011 football season, making six stops over two weeks. Lucky for us South Carolina Gamecock fans and alumni who live in Charlotte, Fort Mill is just over the state line.

With the success of the Fan Fest held at the Garnet and Black Spring Game in April, the Gamecock Club decided to take the show on the road. Photo via South Carolina Gamecocks' Flickr.

Presented by the Gamecock Club, each tour event will last from 5:30 to 8 p.m. and will feature Coach Steve Spurrier, current student-athletes from the local area, Cocky and the cheerleaders, photo opportunities with football and baseball trophies (SEC Eastern Division Championship in football and National Championship in baseball), kids activities, and live music from Tokyo Joe. Admission is only $5.

Here are the Gamecock Fan Fest spring dates and locations:

May 11: Charlotte Knights Baseball Stadium
May 16: Charleston Riverdogs Stadium
May 17: USC-Aiken
May 18: Greenville Drive Stadium
May 24: USC-Sumter
May 25: Darlington Raceway

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Casting Call this Friday for 'Homeland,' New Showtime Pilot Starring Claire Danes

UPDATE: A second casting call for Homeland has been added, scheduled for Tuesday, December 14, 4-7 p.m. at Carolina Mall in Concord. Click here for details.

There's a casting call being held locally this Friday for a new Showtime pilot called Homeland, the Charlotte Regional Film Commission announced yesterday. The casting call is scheduled for 4-7 p.m. at Plaza Fiesta Carolinas in Fort Mill, which is near the Charlotte border. Last month, Showtime announced that Claire Danes had signed on to play the lead in the one-hour drama.

Claire Danes.

In addition to Emmy Award-winner Danes, there's plenty of star power behind the scenes with this pilot. Homeland is being produced and co-written by Howard Gordon, former 24 and The X-Files executive producer and writer, while Dexter director Michael Cuesta is directing. Gideon Raff, Homeland’s creator, based the show on his Israeli TV series Prisoners of War.

The casting call is part of the pre-production work 20th Century Fox Television is currently in town doing. According to the Charlotte Regional Film Commission, the studio is planning to begin shooting the pilot in the area at the beginning of the year and if it's picked up as a series by Showtime, there's a possibility it could continue shooting here.

Click here for more details on the casting call, including a link to a downloadable PDF of a talent profile that's suggested you fill out if you're planning to audition.

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Comedy Zone to Open at NC Music Factory

I just checked my email a few minutes ago and saw that I'd received a press release from Charlotte Center City Partners tonight. They often forward releases from companies who make announcements concerning openings in center city. In this one, The Comedy Zone will be returning to Uptown Charlotte with a new location at NC Music Factory.

This is big news for fans of comedy. Heffron Talent, the company that owns The Comedy Zone, which has dozens of locations around the country, is headquartered in Charlotte. There used to be an Uptown location on College Street, but that closed at the end of 2007. The other area locations are in Lake Norman and Fort Mill, but having it return to the heart of the Queen City has been something people have been wanting for a while.

This could also prove to be a great fit for NC Music Factory, which is keeping its momentum going with the opening of another venue (there's a huge vacant space on the backside of Wet Willie's; I wonder if it's going there). Being able to boast a comedy house gives it one more bullet in the chamber for its shootout with big gun the EpiCentre. Rumor has it, Crobar, the internationally renown nightclub that had supposedly been "coming soon" to NC Music Factory for the past couple of years, has changed course. Crobar is no longer listed on the Music Factory's website, and whisperers are saying that it could instead open at the EpiCentre (Crobar still lists Charlotte on its website but no further details).

But the success of this new Comedy Zone isn't guaranteed. People are cutting back buying tickets to shows--this past summer's music concert season took a beating. Though laughter is often what people are looking for during tough times.

Below is the press release.

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Charlotte Restaurant Week Summer 2010

It comes around twice a year, when fellas can treat their ladies to a nice dinner without breaking the bank. The summer 2010 installment of Charlotte Restaurant Week takes place July 16-25. In what's becoming a local dining tradition, this 10-day celebration of some of the city's finest restaurants once again offers a prix fixe, three-course dinner for $30 per person (not including tax and gratuity) at nearly 90 participating restaurants in the Charlotte area. And several restaurants are known to sweeten the deal by either including a fourth course or throwing in a glass of wine.

Interior shots of some of the participating restaurants - from left to right - bottom row: Customshop, Aquavina, Aria; middle row: Global, Carpe Diem, Vivace; top row: M5, The Liberty, Blue (click image for larger view).

Participating restaurants include:

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This Day In History: Jim Bakker Sentenced

On October 24, 1989, twenty years ago today, television evangelist Jim Bakker was sentenced by a judge in Charlotte to 45 years in prison for fraud and conspiracy. The sentence was later reduced to eight years; then further reduced to four years for good behavior. Before he came crashing down, Jim and then-wife Tammy Faye had built a massive spiritual network in Charlotte and Fort Mill.


Wikipedia chronicles Jim Bakker's rise and fall--in Charlotte--well. See excerpt below.

Teaming with their former youth pastors Paul and Jan Crouch, the Bakkers created the "Praise the Lord" show for the Crouches' new Trinity Broadcasting Network in California. While that relationship lasted only about a year, this time the Bakkers retained the rights to use the initials PTL and traveled east to Charlotte, North Carolina, to begin their own show, The PTL Club. Their show grew quickly until it was carried by close to a hundred stations, with average viewers numbering over twelve million, and the Bakkers had established their own network, The PTL Television Network (also known as PTL-The Inspirational Network). They attributed much of their success to decisions early on to accept all denominations and to refuse no one regardless of race, creed, sexual orientation, or criminal record.

By the early 1980s the Bakkers had built Heritage USA in Fort Mill, South Carolina, (south of Charlotte), then the third most successful theme park in the U.S., and a satellite system to distribute their network 24 hours a day across the country. Contributions requested from viewers were estimated to exceed $1 million a week, with proceeds to go to expanding the theme park and mission of PTL. In justifying his use of the mass media, Bakker responded to inquiries by likening his use of television to Jesus's use of the amphitheater of the time. "I believe that if Jesus were alive today he would be on TV," Bakker said.

PTL's fund raising activities between 1984–1987 underwent scrutiny by The Charlotte Observer newspaper, eventually leading to criminal charges against Jim Bakker. From 1984 to 1987, Bakker and his PTL associates sold $1,000 "lifetime memberships", which entitled buyers to a three-night stay annually at a luxury hotel at Heritage USA. According to the prosecution at Bakker's later fraud trial, tens of thousands of memberships had been sold, but only one 500-room hotel was ever completed. Bakker "sold" more "exclusive partnerships" than could be accommodated, while raising more than twice the money needed to build the actual hotel. A good deal of the money went into Heritage USA's operating expenses, and Bakker kept $3.4 million in bonuses for himself.

Bakker, who apparently made all of the financial decisions for the PTL organization, allegedly kept two sets of books to conceal the accounting irregularities. Reporters from The Charlotte Observer, led by Charles Shepard, investigated and published a series of articles regarding the PTL organization's finances.

On March 19, 1987, following the revelation of a payoff to Jessica Hahn, whom Heritage's chief builder had paid $279,000 from his own funds to keep secret her allegation that he had raped her, Bakker resigned from PTL. Bakker acknowledges he met Hahn at a hotel room in Clearwater Beach, Florida, but denies raping her. Following Bakker's resignation as PTL head, he was succeeded in late March, 1987, by Jerry Falwell. Later that summer, as donations sharply declined in the wake of Bakker's resignation and the end of the Bakkers' popular PTL Club TV show, Falwell raised $20 million to help keep the Heritage USA Theme Park solvent, including a well-publicized waterslide plunge there. Falwell called Bakker a liar, an embezzler, a sexual deviant, and "the greatest scab and cancer on the face of Christianity in 2,000 years of church history." In 1988, Falwell said that the Bakker scandal had "strengthened broadcast evangelism and made Christianity stronger, more mature and more committed."

Following a 16-month Federal grand jury probe, Bakker was indicted in 1988 on eight counts of mail fraud, 15 counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy. In 1989, after a brief five week trial which began on August 28 in Charlotte, the jury found him guilty on all 24 counts, and Judge Robert Potter sentenced him to 45 years in federal prison and a $500,000 fine.

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Charlotte Restaurant Week—and a Half

The third installment of the popular Charlotte Restaurant Week will run for 10 days, beginning Friday, July 10 and ending Sunday, July 19, which means it covers two full weekends. There's also a new high of 71 participating restaurants for this run, known as “Queen’s Feast: Summer 2009.”

During Charlotte Restaurant Week, restaurants--many of them upscale--offer a prix fixe, three-course dinner for $30 per person (not including tax and gratuity). This is a great opportunity for you to try many restaurants for the first time and do it at significant savings. Fellas: this could be a good time to treat your lady to some fine dining.

Basil Thai, which opened in March, is one of 71 restaurants participating in Charlotte Restaurant Week.

Popular returning restaurants include Sonoma Modern American, M5, LaVecchia's, Copper, Blue, Cajun Queen, Ruth's Chris, Carpe Diem, and Noble’s. New participants include Luce, Sole Spanish Grille, Basil Thai, Firenze, Morton’s, Passion8 Bistro in Fort Mill, T1 Tapas and Maddi's Southern Bistro at Birkdale, Old Stone Steakhouse in Belmont, and many others. For a complete list of restaurants and their menus, visit www.CharlotteRestaurantWeek.com.

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Ask These Local Companies for a Job

Each year, Inc. magazine ranks the 500 highest-growth private companies in the country. The magazine actually expanded the popular list to 5,000 this year, but we'll just focus on the crème de la crème. Four local companies made the top 500 and they are: Red Ventures (Charlotte) at No. 17, FireFold (Concord) at No. 73, nGroup (Fort Mill, S.C.) at No. 246, and Red F (Charlotte) at No. 476.

Red Ventures is a marketing firm that solicits new customers for national companies such as DirectTV, Sirius satellite radio, and ADT security systems. The company’s revenue grew to more than $103 million in 2006 from $1.7 million in 2003.

If salaries are increasing at Red Ventures as quickly as revenue (more than 5,000 percent in three years), sign me up.

FireFold specializes in retail sales of audio and video cables and other accessories for high-definition television. Its revenue grew to $6 million in 2006 from $200,000 in 2003.

nGroup is a human resources firm that supplies temporary workers to manufacturing and distribution operations. Its clients include The Home Depot Inc. and Target Corp, and revenue grew to $6 million in 2006 from $510,000 in 2003.

Red F, a marketing firm, focuses on nontraditional marketing methods for clients that include Wachovia Corp. and DirectTV. It increased its revenue to $12.8 million in 2006 from $1.7 million in 2003.

Thirty-four other area companies made the top 5,000. Inc. has published the full list in its September issue, and it's also available at www.inc.com.

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