Former Sonics ad agency WongDoody has scheduled a press conference for April 1st, 2008 at 11 am PDT to discuss a plan for a privately funded basketball arena in downtown Seattle. It is not an April Fools joke and is rumored to have been presented to and possibly "approved by" the NBA and also possibly crafted by former a Sonic player whose banner hangs in the rafters at Key Arena. This is not expected to be tied to either the Steve Ballmer led potential ownership team or any of the previously announced plans by the City of Seattle or Seattle developer David Sabey. Stay tuned folks.
Too bad Stern has all ready made up his mind that Seattle is not NBA-worthy. I wish commissioners and other team execs would realize that fully public stadia are not worth the tax payer money.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (agoo101284 @ Mar 31 2008, 03:57 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>Too bad Stern has all ready made up his mind that Seattle is not NBA-worthy. I wish commissioners and other team execs would realize that fully public stadia are not worth the tax payer money.</div> Stern started backpedalling last week. Something happened...this may have been it.
If a viable solution comes up to keep the Sonics in Seattle and the media makes enough of it, I'm not sure how Stern could dismiss it to be honest. Shaq's comments made me smile, anyway.
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Sir Desmond @ Apr 1 2008, 01:16 AM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}></div><div class='quotemain'>If a viable solution comes up to keep the Sonics in Seattle and the media makes enough of it, I'm not sure how Stern could dismiss it to be honest. Shaq's comments made me smile, anyway.</div> Stern can and will do whatever the majority of his owners want. The key is that the owners are feeling the heat and there is a growing movement among a number of them to be more supportive of Seattle in one way or another. They still don't sound likely to vote down relocation, of the last three relocation votes only one vote TOTAL has ever been negative. This time around we may see more dissent. We have a count of four that have expressed pro-Seattle comments or cautious concern so far. That small number happen to be vocal and a good cross section of the league which may be gaining traction. My guess is that they will try to work a deal that lets Clay do what he wants. However they will also try to get another team through expansion or relocation to come to Seattle within the next 10 years that will be named the Seattle Sonics. This is an uninformed intuition.
Fred Brown and Bill Russell tied with private investors to build a $1.5 BILLION multi-purpose complex to support NHL and NBA expansion teams in 2010-2012 time frames. Emerald City Center It is a fine idea, but they have no money, no land, no team and Stern doesn't want to expand. I can't see the city getting behind it and I doubt the fans get behind it until the team is gone for sure.
