Jay-Z Will Announce Concerts Promoting the "Brooklyn Nets" New Name and Home

Rapper Jay-Z plans to headline a series of concerts to promote the opening of the new Nets arena in downtown Brooklyn and make it official, the team's name will be changed to the "Brooklyn Nets."

Goodbye Jersey shore and hello Coney Island boardwalk.

The rap mogul, who owns a small percentage of the New Jersey Nets, will announce today that he will perform at eight concerts to hype the opening of the arena.  Expect his expecting wife Beyonce to join him and a few other performers to help entice fans to make the trek over to team's new home at the Barclays Center-- which is set to officially open Sept. 28, 2012.

Jay-Z is kicking off a major-marketing campaign aimed at luring Knicks fans from Madison Square Garden over or under the East River into the team's new digs-- where all-access passes are going for $15,000 a season.

Even with the .49-cent tickets you could scrounge on StubHub for some New Jersey Nets games last season, there were still a lot of empty seats in Newark's Prudential Center.  Jay-Z is making sure that doesn't happen with the Brooklyn version.

The entertainer is using his highly popular brand and image to help sell the Brooklyn Nets to the New York City audience for the first time.  The well-known star's rugged face is way more fan-friendly than using majority owner Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov's sourpuss.

Net CEO Brett Yormack said, "Jay-Z will be the face of the team's fourth-quarter campaign" in an attempt to sell the 4,400 all-access passes in the 18,000 seat venue.

Jay-Z will be lending his name and face to a poster with the slogan; "Get all access to Jay-Z's and other events at the Barclays Center."

The campaign will focus on how easy it is to get to the new Brooklyn arena and target the money men working on Wall Street and living in ritzy downtown neighborhoods like Soho and Tribeca.  It even claims you can cut seven minutes of subway time by opting for the Nets over the Knicks from downtown on the Q train.  Who knew?

The Nets new name was a badly kept secret, but after today's announcement, it will be official.  Brooklyn will have it's own name on the front of a major sports league jersey for the first time in over half-a-century.

It remains to be seen if Brooklyn's own Spike Lee will jump ship from his beloved Knicks to his hometown borough.  The film director likes wearing clothes that say "Brooklyn" on them.

Hey, the Nets now even have a Kardashian on their team. If Jay-Z's campaign fails, there's nothing that family's PR machine won't promote.