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Good luck Sacramento. I think most of us are pulling for you guys.
'Final' Vote on Kings Comes Today
HANG TIME HEADQUARTERS – The long wait is almost over … well, we think it might be over.
We could know before nightfall where the Kings will play in the future: Sacramento or Seattle.
The NBA’s Board of Governors meet today in Dallas with an expected final vote by all 30 owners on the Maloof family’s relocation proposal that would move the Kings from Sacramento to Seattle, where a group led by hedge fund manager Chris Hansen and Microsoft executive Steve Ballmer is set to purchase the franchise for a record price.
The formal recommendation two weeks ago from the committee of owners formed to study the relocation plan was a resounding vote for the Kings remaining in Sacramento. But the Maloofs have made it clear that their desire is to go with the Seattle group’s generous reported offer of $406.25 million and flee California’s capital city.
It’s not as simple as that, of course, what with the lawyers involved and the league waist-deep in a back and forth between two cities that are both desperate to keep a team, in Sacramento’s case, and regain a team, in Seattle’s case.
That’s the short version. The long version, in complete detail courtesy my main man, TNT’s David Aldridge, who is going to be on the scene in Dallas today, is much more complicated.
The Seattle group has covered all of its bases in trying to complete this deal. They’ve reached an agreement on that secondary deal, which they want enacted in the case that the Board of Governors reject the relocation proposal today.
That deal would include the Maloofs selling 20 percent of the Kings to the Hansen-led group for $120 million, and that’s based on a franchise valuation of $600 million. The Kings would stay in Sacramento for the 2013-14 season with the Maloofs as the owners. The Hansen group is also willing (and able) to pay an unprecedented $115 million relocation fee, a payout of approximately $4 million for every owner, if the owners allow them to purchase the Kings and move them to Seattle next season, raising the stakes yet again in this hundred million dollar exhibit in the business of basketball.
Sacramento Mayor and former NBA star Kevin Johnson is using the Kings’ history in Sacramento and the NBA’s loyalty to a fan base and city that has supported the Kings fervently, through good times and bad, as his trump card in this saga. The Sacramento group does not seem at all interested in some bidding war for the franchise that’s made it’s home there for last three decades.
Sort through the minutiae as best you can, but the bottom line is one set of fans will wake up tomorrow relieved that they finally have some answers about their team while another group of fans will wake up to the nightmare that their team is either leaving or not coming to town.
Again, the long wait is almost over … we think!
Good luck Sacramento. I think most of us are pulling for you guys.
Ditto. Would be a huge shame and travesty if they allowed the Seattle group bid to win. Sac should keep there team. Thunder never should have moved from Seattle.
Seattle didn't want to build them arena, so Schulz was right to sell them off to Oklahoma. KJ & Sacramento have stepped up to the plate big time and it looks like they'll get that new arena to keep their team. It's a false equivalence to compare Sacramento losing their team with Seattle. The Kings have had a tough time getting an arena deal done because of a crippling depression in the area, but now even through that adversity they have a workable plan. Seattle just flat out didn't care after the Mariners and Seahawks got their new stadiums and were having more success than the Sonics. Public funding of arenas sucks, but corporate welfare is the American way and without it, your non LA, Chicago, New York, Miami, Philadelphia, DC, SF market isn't going to keep its team.
Rooting for Sacto all the way. Small market teams (that are not OKC) need to stick together!
The Kings have actually put forth at least three arena deals, it's just that the Maloofs kept sabotaging all of them....
It was a different situation, yes. But I still wish they had stayed in Seattle.
Maloofs are lousy owners ...
I got buddies in Seattle that would love the NBA to return, I'm pulling for them.. It would suck for the hardcore Kings fans though.
I hope the vote goes Seattle's way. Seattle is much more deserving of an NBA franchise than Sacramento.
I just want the Maloofs to be ed over as much as possible tbh.
Good luck Seattle.
I agree, but the perfect scenario would be if they move Charlotte. It just isn't working there.
That way, they also could do it a little like with the Browns and rename it to Supersonics, erasing the history of the Bobcats (nothing to remember anyway) and just pretending as if the Sonics never realy moved.
I should have said "move the Bobcats" as Charlotte probably will stay where it is.
Seattle couldn't hold on to an NBA team. They had their chance; fans voted against the team by not s ing out when the Sonics sucked.
Sacramento shouldn't have to pay for Seattle's mistakes.
Sacramento has proven to be more deserving with the efforts KJ has put forth to keep the Kings in town, tbh....
Key Arena was fine.
The insane money cities spend to subsidize billionaire owners is one of the many ways this country redistributes wealth to the top without anyone realizing it.
http://www.news10.net/
click the live video link. they haven't started yet but I assume it'll be soon
I fully agree, but this country is what it is and if you don't bend over and build the team their huge arena they can make risk-free profits in from luxury boxes, restaurants, bars, fan shops, etc you're not keeping your team if you're not LA, SF, NYC, etc.
everybody that watched sonicsgate is an nba economic expert
Seattle
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