Haven’t heard of the NBA Entertainment League? It’s no longer a secret. . Photographs by Brad Hines.

Shane Duffy doesn’t green-light movies. He doesn’t throw Oscar-night galas or guide A-list careers. If he walks the red carpet, he does so in settings other than Grauman’s Chinese Theatre and the Golden Globes ceremony.

But the case can be made that he’s the most powerful man in Hollywood … or at least the most powerful man in Hollywood recreation. Duffy, you see, heads the celeb-stocked NBA Entertainment League (NBAE). It may not be the most exclusive fraternity in Los Angeles (that would be the $20-million-per-picture club), but it’s certainly close.

It’s a league in which, on any given Sunday, you might find Jamie Foxx driving past Adam Sandler for a layup or see Will Ferrell enmeshed with Ice Cube in the low post. You might see a sequence in which Snoop Dogg starts a fast break with an outlet pass to Justin Timberlake, who then dishes across the key to Jaleel White (that’s right, Steve Urkel) for an easy finish. You might witness not one Superman but two -- Brandon Routh, all elbows and angles as he works the offensive boards, and Dean Cain, who takes a charge as eagerly as a jayvee kid trying to make the varsity team -- appear to be as encumbered by gravity as the rest of us.

Yet, while the A-list names may lend the league its glamour, the NBAE is very much an egalitarian operation. Ferrell, Timberlake, and past participants such as Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey

Maguire net the league its few headlines (besides a small item in the New York Post, it has largely remained off the media radar), but once they enter the gym, they’re just some guys in high-tops. Let’s put it this way: Given the choice between having a big star with far-reaching professional tentacles and having a former Division I hoops player who stands six-foot-five and shoots more than 50 percent from the field for a teammate, most everybody in the league would choose the latter. The players show up to have fun, break a sweat, and hang with their peers. But once the whistle sounds, they want to win. Badly.

Take, for example, Donald Faison of Scrubs and Clueless, one of the league’s longer-tenure players -- and, much to his dismay, one of the handful of veterans not in possession of a championship ring. “It sucks to lose,” says Faison, shaking his head ruefully. “I don’t have any great memories yet because I’ve lost each year in the playoffs.” But what about the buddies he’s made, the contacts he’s forged, or the intrinsic rewards of teamwork? “That doesn’t matter,” he says. “The only good part of that is if I meet somebody here and then I see them in an audition and I don’t get the job, at least I know I busted their butt on the basketball court.”

The NBA Entertainment League was birthed from a regular pickup game featuring a host of friends with showbiz-world connections. It launched in 1999 with eight teams and a lower caliber of celebrity. It quickly became evident that the players enjoyed not only the competition but also the opportunity to see each other regularly. “How many times are you going to get a guy to play golf with you?” asks Cain rhetorically. And so the NBAE grew rapidly, and it now comprises two divisions of eight teams each and 192 players.

The league plays a 15-game regular season of 40-minute contests (two 20-minute halves, with a running clock). Most of the players show up for eight or nine games. Uniforms must be tucked in. Headbands must match. Undershirts and jewelry are strictly prohibited. A revolving staff of eight referees monitors the proceedings.

Not surprisingly, invitations to play are hard to come by. In Hollywood hoops, as in Hollywood deal making, it’s all about the back-channel maneuvers. Duffy receives solicitations from people up and down the industry food chain, including agents, publicists, friends of friends -- you name it. He also scouts out potential additions during pickup games on Tuesday mornings and during the summer. While the championship squad remains intact for the following season so as to have a chance to defend its title, the rosters of the other teams are shuffled; the NBAE has seen no Celtic-esque dynasties.

“Every single person is in this league for a reason,” Duffy says. “I’ll take a chance on a young actor over a director with a few films out, because [the actor] might be more visible from a promotional standpoint. He may show up in People magazine before the other guy.”

Running the NBAE isn’t Duffy’s primary professional responsibility. He heads the NBA’s Los Angeles office as director, entertainment marketing, player and talent relations, a role in which he helps coordinate NBA/Hollywood tie-ins, among other duties. Still, he clearly treasures his role as the NBAE’s commissioner, facilitator, peacekeeper, promoter, and ego wrangler.

For eight-plus hours every Sunday, Duffy bounces between the stands and the sidelines, working players and spectators alike with the easy familiarity of a small-town mayor. Banter comes naturally to him, and he uses it both when he’s needling his charges (to Johnny Alves, cousin of actor Mark Wahlberg and the reported inspiration for the character of Johnny Drama on Entourage, he yips, “You have six points? You shoot 38 times, you better have more than six points!”) and when he’s defusing tense situations with a comforting word and a pat on the shoulder.

The players are very much “his” guys; he talks up their careers and their on-court abilities like a proud parent would. He notes how Frankie Muniz of Malcolm in the Middle fame “has grown up in this room” and how fledgling actor and boy-band member Bobby Edner, 19, the league’s youngest player, “is so smart. He’s thinking about interning with one of the guys so that he gets a good handle on the business.” When young and largely unknown actor Jarod Einsohn departs after a quick schmooze session, Duffy says, conspiratorially, “He’s up for a huge part. It’s going to happen for him; you can just tell.” Duffy knows his players’ on-court tendencies too. Before actor Jon Sklaroff fires up a three-pointer, Duffy calls “glass.” As if on cue, the shot careens off the backboard and kisses the net as it drops through the hoop.

The secret Santa Monica, California, facility in which the league sets up shop on Sundays feels and looks like a typical high school gym. There are Gatorade coolers on the sidelines, bleachers lining one wall, and a midcourt scoring table manned by a gaggle of statisticians and timekeepers. Getting past the front door ain’t easy, though. To keep the games relatively gawker-free, the league employs a four-man security crew, all dressed like Secret Service agents in dark suits, with the de rigueur Bluetooth dongles wedged in their ears. Food and cameras are not allowed; bags are searched on the way in. To gain admission, spectators must be registered in advance.

Even with those security measures, the NBAE League hasn’t been entirely successful in shielding its players and guests from scrutiny. While accommodations were made to sneak a pregnant Jessica Alba out a side entrance, on another occasion, a ninja-like paparazzo was able to snap a stealth shot of Demi Moore, Ashton Kutcher, and their brood. “We still don’t know where the guy was,” Duffy says.

That said, celebrities and civilians alike seem at ease in the gym’s cozy confines. In the stands, it’s all sunglasses, stilettos, and Sidekicks -- the NBAE gym may well be the planet’s preeminent venue for gawking at dolled-up women at 11 a.m. on Sunday morning. Pro players like Shaquille O’Neal, Tayshaun Prince, Mitch Richmond, Shane Battier, and Chris Bosh have made the scene in recent years. Former NFL star Keyshawn Johnson lazes about in the stands, just another guy watching his friends play ball. A few feet away, two women -- either twins or members of an En Vogue–like act -- sit together silently, dressed identically and exquisitely.

Former Jessica Simpson assistant Cacee Cobb, on the other hand, cheers on Faison with the unbridled enthusiasm of a college kid and lashes out at an opposing player who gets mouthy. “I usually don’t yell like what you saw, but it’s always rough out there,” she says brightly.

She isn’t exaggerating: The NBAE games boast considerably more intensity than one would expect from a league stocked with successful Hollywood personalities, many of whom rely on their unsullied, unscratched mugs for making a living. The league teems with one-time jocks, and former NFL players (Cain, Terry Crews, Jamal Duff, Brian White) are especially well represented. The handful of former Division I basketball players, including UCLA’s Bob Meyers, are coveted. Nana Gbewonyo (Coach Carter) recently received a look-see from the NBA’s developmental league.

On the other hand, singer/actor Brian McKnight argues that the intensity of the games shouldn’t come as a surprise. “These are some of the most competitive people in the world. They bring it onto the court.” Foxx clearly does: A few years ago, he arrived at a game still wearing the credentials from the Grammy rehearsal he skipped out on in order to play. He did, however, call in sick on the Sunday he won an Oscar for Ray. In any event, there’s something enormously cool about seeing individuals who are recognizable to a sizable percentage of the U.S. population sprint back on defense as if a back-nine series pickup depended upon it.

While nobody will confuse the overall effort of the league’s athletes with that of the Pat Riley–era Knicks, the NBAE-ers do play diligently and intelligently. The shoot-first, apologize-later mentality of school-yard hoops games still reigns, but a few teams have installed structured offenses. In fact, the Faison-led Cleveland Cavaliers (no, not the team led by LeBron) have hired a coach -- a basketball lifer known as Slappy, who declines to share his given name -- for that very purpose.

Ferrell, who plays alongside Faison, Josh Duhamel (Las Vegas), and his producing partner Adam McKay on the Cavaliers, pays close attention to Slappy during late-game time-outs. His on-court persona, a focused player who’s deferential to the ball, clashes with his off-court one. After the Cavaliers beat the Suns with a last-second three-pointer by Michael Westphal (an actor and the son of NBA great Paul Westphal), Ferrell joins his team in a raucous sideline celebration. When it quiets down, he offers, “Hey, how about a group shower?” He finishes the game with two points, two rebounds, and an assist.

Sandler, on the other hand, comes across as quiet and almost preternaturally laidback. As his New York Knicks teammates -- actors Arlen Escarpeta and Joel David Moore, among others -- prepare for their game by making layups and hopping around the court, Sandler warms up with a series of solo 10-yard sprints along the sideline. When the whistle blows, he proves to be a surprisingly cagey rebounder for a guy who stands about five-foot-ten. Unlike Ferrell, who joshes around with actor Jerrod Paige while a teammate makes free throws, Sandler maintains an all-business mien throughout.

To a man, the players state that the camaraderie, rather than the chance to hobnob with those higher up on the Hollywood pecking order, is why they love the league. Still, none deny that a certain amount of networking takes place, some of it slightly crass. “It’s the alternative golf course,” says Matthew Lillard (Scream, Scooby-Doo).

Nobody knows for sure just how many gigs have been secured as a result of pre- and post-game networking, but movies such as John Q and Coach Carter have proven to be veritable NBAE fests. Director Nick Cassavetes snared three league members and one player’s wife to fill out the cast of John Q, and producer Brian Robbins netted a few other players for Coach Carter. Despite the presence of many hugely influential execs -- Lions Gate Films higher-up John Sacchi and Frasier writer/executive producer Christopher Lloyd among them -- the players talk only so much shop in and around the court.

This doesn’t stop McKnight from touting his upcoming role in Sweetwater, a biopic of Nathaniel “Sweetwater” Clifton, the NBA’s first black player. “I got my first starring role here. It wouldn’t have happened if [the director] hadn’t seen me drop 40 [points] on somebody,” he crows. Martin Guigui, the film’s director, seems taken aback to hear this. “He’s certainly one of the guys we’re looking at,” he says uneasily.

You might not be able to help your career by playing in the NBAE, but you sure could hurt it. Divas and ball hogs are not tolerated. Battle says, affirmatively and for the record, “This is a jerk-free league.”

“I’ve learned whom I can work with and whom I can’t work with,” says NFL player turned actor Crews (Everybody Hates Chris). “Your integrity’s on the line. Are you a crier? Are you a whiner?” Lillard puts it more succinctly: “You know right away who’s a jerk.”

NBAE participation also clues in players to their emerging professional status. “When The Shield first came out, I had no idea that anybody in the industry had noticed us. Then, all of a sudden, everybody here was saying, ‘Hey, great work!’ It was like, ‘Wow! Really?’ ” recalls Benito Martinez, who is roughly 4,000 times as chatty and personable as the character he plays.

After camaraderie, most players cite the perks -- which, not unexpectedly, are significant -- as a big selling point. As the NBAE has grown, so, too, has the volume of swag. Most regular pickup games don’t kick off a new season with a 500-person launch party, much less with one featuring a set from Ice Cube, a video-screen reveal of the upcoming season’s rosters, and the basketball equivalent of boxing’s ring girls.

During the league’s first season, players received commonplace reversible jerseys. Now they are outfitted precisely like the pros, wearing the same kind of Adidas jerseys, shorts, and pullover tops and carting their gear in the same type of bags with team insignias. The league holds its championship weekend in April, and the winners receive title rings made by Jason of Beverly Hills. “Sometimes I wear mine to Vegas. You know, just to let everybody know I’m the man,” Cain quips.

The NBAE stalwarts have played on the Staples Center court for charity -- “They’ll stop whatever they’re doing to play at Staples,” Duffy brags -- and in front of 17,000-strong crowds at Phoenix’s America West Arena, as part of the league’s traveling schedule, that has taken them to cities such as New York, Detroit, Atlanta, Dallas, and Kansas City. They jump on a plane on Friday, hang with the locals that night, and then participate in a charity game the next afternoon, usually alongside NBA stars from the area and out-of-town entertainers (like Usher and Chris Brown). The league has played games in a hangar at Edwards Air Force Base for Military Appreciation Day and has traveled to South Korea on a USO tour. “We got to fly around in Chinook helicopters,” Duffy says, sounding like a kid.

If Duffy has any concerns as he heads deeper into the league’s second decade, they are about scale. “Every year, it gets a little bigger. You give guys shoes, and then they expect it every year,” he explains. “How do you top Ice Cube at the launch party? It’s hard to compete with what we’ve already done.”

With a 200-strong waiting list of players, the NBAE could expand to the point of matching the real NBA’s 30 teams. For the 2008–2009 campaign, it will ditch the pens and pads and adopt the official NBA statistical system, which allows real-time posting of stats on the Internet. Televising the league’s travel games remains a possibility, and the league will likely become bicoastal before too long, launching an offshoot in New York City.

Whatever happens, Duffy will be behind the wheel for it. When asked about someday passing the commissioner torch, he pauses and, for the first time in several hours, is struck speechless. “I don’t know. It’s kind of my baby. It always has been,” he says. He doesn’t consider himself irreplaceable, but he notes how the players and their support systems -- families, friends, agents, publicists, et al -- trust him to do right by them.

“I’ve groomed them,” he says with a guffaw. “But they’ve also groomed me. Hopefully, we’ll keep each other in line for a while longer.”

role reversal

actors have been pretending to be athletes since before hollywood was hollywood, so it seems only fair for nba players to turn the tables. here are our starting five (plus one) nba superstars who have appeared on camera -- but not in basketball-playing roles.

julius erving, or “dr. j,” on frasier (1996) as mike, a caller to frasier’s radio show

charles barkley on santa barbara (1991) as a bartender

kareem abdul-jabbar in airplane (1980) as roger murdock, possibly the world’s tallest copilot

magic johnson on malcolm in the middle (2002) as ringer hockey player no. 32

shaquille o’neal in kazaam (1996) as the world’s most powerful genie

off the bench: dennis rodman in simon sez (1999) as an interpol agent