It's too early to give up on the Bobcats. They opened up a new arena less than two years ago and they haven't put together a winning team yet. People forget how hot of a basketball market Charlotte is. There was a stretch where they sold out the Coliseum for years. That's the type of success most franchises dream of having. Sonics were for sale, state refused to build them an arena, Clay Bennett bought the team. Seattle fans get a raw deal but it's business.
Well the crappy part may be that apparently Clay Bennett group may have been intending to move to Oklahoma when they bought the team and weren't bargaining fairly with the city to try to stay in Seattle.
The NBA is not a free market business; it is a monopolistic gang of suits who basically cater to a few billionaire and near billionaire owners. When Carmelo Anthony is given a 15 game suspension for a little punch that some swore was more like a slap, why would anyone think that the NBA cares about fans, who are the next level down from players? And who is competing with the NBA? No one, really, unless you want to get interested in European basketball. For example, does anyone to speak of care about what is happening with the Montana Golden Nuggets? But as someone in this topic alluded to, this kind of heavy handed business monopoly is normal in America, and governments are supposed to bow down to it or be robbed blind. (He certainly didn't put it that way, lol.) But Seattle metro has over 3.3 million people and Oklahoma metro has about 1.2 million people. And the central area of Seattle metro is much more densely packed with people than is the central area of Oklahoma metro. Also, Seattle has far better public transit, which will be critical now that gas is going to be about $5 a gallon or, gulp, even more. So factoring in total population, central area density and the gas situation, the potential long term basketball market in Seattle must be somewhere between 4 and 6 times the potential long term basketball market in Oklahoma. So for how many years do you think there will be bigger potential crowds and merchandise sales in Oklahoma instead of in Seattle? Would you think it would be one, two, or three years before the law of numbers asserts itself and bigger crowds and merchandise sales are available in Seattle? But monopolistic gangs of suits catering to a few billionaires and near billionaires don't look at obvious free enterprise business factors like that. You or I would make more money in Seattle than Oklahoma, but Bennett is so rich that he doesn't care if he makes a few million less long term in Oklahoma than in Seattle. He's just a "Look maw, I dun bought me a basketball team and dragged it back here to the farm" type of billionaire.
That makes sense that Oklahoma with the smaller market probably in time will have a harder time to sell out. The only thing I can think off that might make a difference is that Seattle does have other professional sports teams though like the SeaHawks and Mariners, and Oklahoma doesn`t have any others.
