The cash-strapped Miyazaki Shining Suns have made it known they want to fold the team or defect to the NBDL (the re-launched JBL2) next season, the Miyazaki Nichinichi Shimbun reported Saturday.
The Shining Suns, a third-year franchise with a bj-league-worst 9-35 record entering this weekend's series against the visiting Osaka Evessa, informed league officials on Feb. 4 that they want to pull out of the pro circuit before the 2013-14 season. It is unclear if the Shining Suns will field a team next season, what with past crises for the Oita HeatDevils and Takamatsu Five Arrows, both of which announced publicly that they were on the verge of folding on multiple occasions.
In a news release on Saturday afternoon, the bj-league stated that "a club that pulls out from the next season must apply to the league by June 30 of the previous year," as required by bj-league regulation 7-1. Therefore, in regard to pulling out of for the 2013-14 season, the deadline was June 30, 2012, and the application submitted by the Miyazaki Energy Create, Inc., was late.