<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post"> NEW YORK (AP) -- NBA owners unanimously approved the sale of the SuperSonics on Tuesday to a group headed by Oklahoma City businessman Clay Bennett, who says he wants to keep the team in Seattle. Whether he does almost certainly depends on if he gets a new building. Bennett's group purchased the SuperSonics and WNBA's Storm from the Basketball Club of Seattle, led by Starbucks chairman Howard Schultz, on July 18 for $350 million. That brought immediate speculation that the team would be moved to Oklahoma City. But Bennett said his focus now is on getting a new arena in Seattle, and not on what will happen if he doesn't. "We haven't really thought a lot about the end game as it relates to not getting the building," Bennett said. "We're focused on getting the building and working hard on getting the building and we'll evaluate our business and our prospects as we go through the process." Bennett's group will take full control of the Sonics next Tuesday when the transaction is completed. Seated next to NBA commissioner David Stern, Bennett said his preference is to keep the Sonics in Seattle.</div> Link.
I wish Bennett would stop lying about his intentions to move the Sonics to Oklahoma. It's insulting. Like I didn't hate him enough?
Don't hate Clay Bennett. I honestly believe that if he gets the arena that he wants he will stay in the surrounding area. I just don't think that he will get the arena that he wants. The person to blame in all of this remains Howard Schultz. He could have sold the team to local investors or he could have done a better job negotiating for an arena. He wanted to throw it in the city and state legislators faces that they had to do step up and do what is necessary to keep the team in Seattle. How did he do that? By selling to an investment group from a city that is proving to be a viable NBA market. I just feel bad for people like Rick Sund who will probably end up being fired just because Bennett wants to clean house. I honestly think that Bennett, not knowing him at all, is an extremely intelligent man who will make objective decisions. But for the amount of money that is invested in this project, you can't blame him for wanting to be around his people. Hopefully he is true to his word. Seattle will always be a better market than OKC, so I wouldn't dismiss the fact that Clay will exhaust the avenues that he feels he needs to exhaust in order to keep the team in the surrounding area. Hopefully that will be enough for the legislation to award him an arena.
