The lucrative promise of the Club World Championship the following year is seemingly hard to dismiss, even when it comes to preserving the sanctity of an ancient tradition.
When the Heinrich Malan-coached Stags play the Canterbury Wizards at Hagley Park, Christchurch, from 7.15pm tomorrow, it'll signal the start of the 2013-14 T20 campaign of the domestic season.
Effectively it's the clash of the bottom dwellers, the Wizards finishing fifth last season, four points above CD after winning three games to the visitors' two.
When the only-way-is-up scenario for CD is put to new South African coach Malan, he laughs before pointing out they were all pretty close games last summer.
"Only one or two games didn't go to plan," he says before the Stags had a warm-up hit against a Hawke's Bay Invitation side yesterday afternoon at Nelson Park, Napier.
Fundamentally Malan believes a few tweaks and adjustments should tilt those agonising losses of last season in favour of the Stags.
Kieran Noema-Barnett returns as captain of the 12 named with one to be omitted, depending on what the season-opening wicket at Hagley Park is likely to serve up.
"It's early in the season so obviously the Twenty20 wicket will be a flat one so there are runs on the board," Malan says.
With spinners Tarun Nethula and Marty Kain in the mix and a rash of allrounders, he reckons CD have covered all their bases.
Manawatu's Bevan Small is out injured for a fortnight.
"He had a rib removal off season and that's not 100 per cent so we want him to be at full speed before he returns because he has some combination value to add," Malan says of Small, who Manawatu coach Michael Mason rested during their Chapple Cup final loss in Napier a fortnight ago.
With Black Caps allrounder Doug Bracewell coming in at No8, Malan says CD will bat deep.
With Somerset allrounder Peter Trego returning to take care of some unfinished business after his premature end in just the third round last summer, there's hope his injection will give some latitude for youngsters such as William Young and Ben Smith.
"Hopefully that'll allow Smith and Young to play with some flair and freedom to put us in good stead."
Malan says Kain comes in as the second spinner based on his "best performer" status last season.
"He can bat anywhere up to six and right at the end, so he'll fill those roles."
Tweaker Ajaz Patel, he feels, trained well, had a great pre-season and is in good physical shape but on the fringe of selection.
"It's good to have that sort of competition in the squad."
Noema-Barnett is at an important stage of development as skipper after leading CD to Plunket Shield victory last season.
"He has a lot of experienced players around him like Kruger [van Wyk], Howser [Jamie How] and Trego," he says.
Asked if captaincy may be inhibiting the prowess of the explosive Noema-Barnett as a game changer, Malan agrees the statistics in the T20 campaign don't lie.
"He has that explosiveness but he's also grown a hell of a lot in the captaincy role.
"He is in fantastic physical shape and we've also worked with him on the technical side of things and made some adjustments."
Conspicuous in his absence is retired record-breaking batsman Mathew Sinclair.
The responsibility of a seasoned middle-order batsman to tick the run rate over should the top order collapse will now rest on the shoulders of fellow veteran wicketkeeper van Wyk, who has performed with aplomb in the past.
With one sleep to go, Malan is excited to begin his maiden season in New Zealand.
From a coaching perspective, though, he hastens to add it's about the boys going through the process, as it were.
"I'll have to have the boys ready and kicking to get them over that line but it's also important that they're enjoying themselves."
Wizards coach Gary Stead, who has had former international Chris Martin alongside him since September as assistant coach, will no doubt want a robust start to their campaign.
Hagley Park is reopening following the Christchurch earthquake in 2011.
Last night, CD beat the Bay Invitational side by 43 runs.
The Stags amassed 150-7, with How scoring 33 (37 balls), Young 33 (24) and Trego 32 (23).
Angus Schaw top-scored for the Bay with 19 (16).
Former Black Caps allrounder Lance Cairns and ex-CD Stags coach Alan Hunt have been named as New Zealand's Cricket's high-performance talent scouts.
NZC general manager national selection Bruce Edgar says: "Lance has a strong background in selecting and coaching, while Alan is across the game currently and has a really good eye for talent."
Hunt, a former Auckland first-class cricketer, coached the Stags for the past three seasons. In that spell CD won the Plunket Shield (2012-13) and the Ford Trophy (2011-12). In previous seasons they were HRV Cup and shield runners up.
