Sonics to OKC: Presser in 20

[CoachBo]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008030229_sonitrial02.html

Nice to see the city finally grew up and cut itself a decent deal.

Looking forward to seeing the Celtics in person again out here in the Midwest.

[cordobes]

Fine. It was nice to meet you Seattle SuperSonics, some good memories will endure.

Congratulations to the good people of Oklahoma for the new sports team. Well deserved, after all the enthusiastic support you gave to the Hornets. And to Clay Bennett for having the chance of running a profitable enterprise. Go Okies! (What's going to be the new name of the team? Are they keeping the Sonics?)

[CoachBo]

Word is the name stays as part of the deal.

Great market that backed the Hornets 100 percent for two years. City worked hard to put together an incentive package - when Seattle was apathetic - to get the team.

Really looking forward to a short drive to see KG, Ray and the Truth next winter.

[houlana]

very sad situation for the fans in seatle, the team should have stayed after all the years in that city.

imagin someone even attempting to move the celts?

[EarthBall]

How is this good for the NBA? Besides the whole conspiracy theory about the Sonics owners and relocating them to OKC (which appears to be less of a theory everyday), this means that the NBA will have one more team whenever Seattle gets a new team. Furthermore, Oklahoma City? How come they get a team when more interesting cities like Pittsburgh and St Louis don't have teams? And what free agents are going to come to OKC?

At least it isn't as bad as the NHL where Columbus and Nashville have teams?

[cordobes]

Those poor fans in Seattle never showed much interest in the Sonics during these last years, have they?

Are Pittsburgh and St Louis interest in having a team? Have they done anything to have a team? OKC fans showed they know basketball and how to support a team.

Besides, and more important, the owner chose to move to OKC. It's his franchise. And the other owners allowed the move.

[RebusRankin]

Seattle actually had good attendance this year and in previous years. I know Indiana, New Orleans, Memphis and Minnesota all had lower attendance figures this past season. Can't blame a city for not wanting to build a 500 million dollar arena, 13 years after building a new facility.

[paintitgreen]

Seriously, no offense to Oklahoma City fans, they did nothing wrong, but this team was hijacked because the city didn't want to build a new arena every ten years. And if the lease was bad, that's the team's fault because they negotiated it and Bennett knew about it when he went in and bought the team. They made no real effort to stay in Seattle. It's an outrageous show of disloyalty by the NBA to its fans.

I'm fine with OKC getting a team over Pittsburgh (really? that's a low to mid market with 3 teams already) or St. Louis (same). As you all said, the city really supported a team in need (even though it obviously wasn't a tough team to support but rather a rising powerhouse-wonder how it would have gone if the Hornets were 10-31 in OKC like they can expect the Boomers to be for the next few years) and rewarding them is fine. But robbing Seattle for no good reason is just greed in its purest form. I hate this happening.

[EarthBall]

I'm fine with OKC getting a team over Pittsburgh (really? that's a low to mid market with 3 teams already) or St. Louis (same).

It's getting off topic, but Pittsburgh would totally embrace a basketball team (they had the Ironmen in 1946 and the Condors in the ABA - Mark Cuban said they deserve a team http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/sports/s_476722.html). They love anything yellow and black. St Louis is stretching it, sure, but I would say there are more sports nuts around STL than OKC. I would also rather visit 'The Gateway to the West' than 'The City' (I even had to look up OKC's nickname http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_city_nicknames_in_the_United_States#Oklahoma -- that's how undeserving they are of an NBA team)

[pearljammer10]

Its a sad sad day for the NBA when Seattle looses its basketball nation...What a shame.

[CoachBo]

It's always sad - for the fans - when a city loses (and Seattle lost) this franchise.

And deservedly so, as this link illustrates:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008010010_sonitrial21.html

The city dealt dishonestly with the ownership group, and apathetically with the franchise dating back to the Howard Schultz ownership.

I feel bad for the fans, because their city's mayor and council dealt them out of professional basketball. But as for the politicians, they got exactly what they deserved. You can only dream about the damages winnable in court over a conspiracy to force you to sell your business.

[nickagneta]

A lot of this discussion should be centered around the politics behind running an NBA franchise and how local politics, NBA politics and money all intertwine to force these events into play.

Politics is rightfully a dirty word here though. So.....

My opinion is that an owner of a franchise should be able to put his franchise wherever the hell he wants. Its his. If the good people of Seattle are smart enough not to give in to pay for a new venue every 10 years for the Sonics I applaud them. The Sonics should have ponied up some cash and bought into the arena at some point so that they could have properly planned the arena to make it profitable enough to stay there long term.

I understand it is not the norm for NBA franchises to own their own venues but at some point I think it's time for teams to realize that they need to contribute in some way to the construction and planning of these new arenas so that they are long term viable to the team. If that means buying into a portion of the building I think that is smart business for all concerned.

But the team owners don't want this. They want all the money from the luxury boxes, they want up to date, comfortable, accessible facilities and yet they want the public to pay for every penny of it while they pay a relatively small yearly fee on a lease to stay there. And if times go bad for the team and the fan base isn't loyal at the gate, they want to be able to screw.

As much as I think the owner should have the right to leave whenever he wants, I also believe it is incumbant upon the owners to start to look into being at least part owners of the places they play in. The taxpayer shouldn't be footing all that bill.

But as long as places like Oklahoma City, Cincinnati, Madison, Tampa, Birmingham, Nashville, Jacksonville, Las Vegas, Columbia, Montreal, Mexico City, Santa Fe and the like decide that they want to build an arena and guarantee a season ticketholder fanbase, NBA owners will have the ability to tell cities build it or we will move.

So the people of Seattle, Memphis, Minnesota and the like have a choice. Build the billionaire owners a new place to play or watch them move someplace where taxpayers are willing to pay for a new arena. Until the taxpayers across America get it, some franchises in basketball will be nomadic.

Mods. If I went to fair politically please erase this, don't shut down the thread. ... Nick

[dlpin]

As much right as the owners of a franchise have to move it, this whole thing was done in an an unethical way as possible. Don't forget that the key arena was renovated with public funds, and the new owners basically blackmailed their way out of seattle, trying to break a lease they signed.

I believe today's decision would have gone for the city, but at this point I am quite certain the city will be getting a new team soon. The language of the settlement says the amount owed the city goes down significantly if they get a new team, and while not too long ago Stern was saying Seattle would never get a new team, during the finals he said it was a possibility, if the city "was nice to them." Now, the question is whether its a new expansion team (which would suck, diluting the talent even more) or memphis or carolina (teams which the owners have been considering selling/relocating)

[CoachBo]

Good points, Nick, and it's indicative of the economic development climate in which we live.

There's no such thing as owner-financed eco devo any more. It's publicly financed and it's a bidding war. To the highest bidder go the spoils.

Essentially, OKC outbid a community that showed little interest in the franchise politically until it became clear they were going to leave.

No community has a divine right to have a professional franchise, including Boston.

And given the involvement of a city attorney in the conspiracy to force Bennett to sell, as illustrated in the above link, it is anything but certain the city would have prevailed. In fact, there are legal experts on the Web who indicated they expected the Sonics to prevail.

[dlpin]

It's always sad - for the fans - when a city loses (and Seattle lost) this franchise.

And deservedly so, as this link illustrates:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008010010_sonitrial21.html

The city dealt dishonestly with the ownership group, and apathetically with the franchise dating back to the Howard Schultz ownership.

I feel bad for the fans, because their city's mayor and council dealt them out of professional basketball. But as for the politicians, they got exactly what they deserved. You can only dream about the damages winnable in court over a conspiracy to force you to sell your business.

What you are leaving out is that these actions by the city came about AFTER Bennett asked for a 500 million dollar arena in a suburb, said the only thing he would contribute towards it was the naming rights, specifically told its PR person to avoid mentioning any other contributions, said he would not contribute to any cost overruns, refused to discuss any alternatives that involved renewing Key Arena, refused to meet the mayor to discuss altering the lease, and had one of its coowners say they had never wanted to leave the team in Seattle. OKC didnt outbid seattle. As a matter of fact, OKC is putting much less money than seattle had offer to put in to renew the Key. But that was never Bennett's plan. Which is fine, given that its his franchise, but if anyone "poisoned the well" it was him, trying to get out of the lease 2 years early, which he did.