Pacific Park, Brooklyn
The Barclays Center is the new home arena of the National Basketball Association's Brooklyn Nets, and the NHL's New York Islanders which was purchased by a group led by principal developer Bruce Ratner with the intention of making it and the arena the centerpiece of the whole project. This brought major league professional sports to Brooklyn for the first time since the Brooklyn Dodgers moved to Los Angeles, California after the 1957 season. The arena’s design once included an ice skating rink and a green roof. An NBA basketball team now owned primarily by Russia's second richest man Mikhail Prokhorov, the Nets began playing at the Barclays Center arena in 2012. Formerly the New Jersey Nets, the Nets re-branded themselves when they moved to the Barclays Center. Prokhorov is an avid basketball fan, and, with 80 percent ownership in the Nets, he has become the first Russian owner of a major U.S. professional sports franchise. The deal was necessary for Ratner, who was risking losing tax-exempt financing and the Barclays naming-rights deal if he did not break ground within three months' time.
Sports in the New York metropolitan area
Regardless of where they actually play their home games, most of these teams carry the name of and represent the entire city or State of New York, except for the NBA's Brooklyn Nets, who play in and specifically represent the New York City borough of Brooklyn, and the NHL's New Jersey Devils, who have played their home games in New Jersey since their founding in the metropolitan area via relocation and have always been in direct competition with New York-based rivals, whereas the New York Red Bulls (MLS founding franchise once named New York/New Jersey MetroStars)–who have also always played in New Jersey–were the only major professional soccer team representing the metropolitan area during their first 19 seasons.