Words can't express how disappointed and pissed off I am right now.
But before I completely throw in the towel I want to hear from Hansen/Ballmer and see if something else shakes out from the BOG meeting. On Hansen's side, there's just too much work & investment already made for him to let this drop - the land's been purchased, the agreements with the city for the arena are all hammered out.
The Owners are going to vote for what makes them the most $$$ in the long-run. As has been said, this probably gave Sacramento a bigger edge than we realized - allowing the move after Sacto had bent over backwards to come up with a viable (although not nearly as good) offer to keep the team would've destroyed the NBA's leverage in any future arena/relocation dispute. They could always point to Seattle as an example of "you don't do business with us, and we're gone" well, if they left Sacto, then any city could simply say, "and even if we do work with you, we can get screwed"
But still - the situation here in Seattle is so strong, the ownership group is loaded, the market is swimming in dough ... getting a team back here is nothing but a $$$$ rain-shower for the League.
Stern is the only one that has acted like expansion's not an options (and he's a smarmy 2-faced bastard and was probably trying to keep the pressure on both bidders) I still can't believe that the owners would be so short-sighted to rule out expansion as well at this point.
That's what I'm still hoping happens - we get the immediate guarantee of an expansion team that starts play in a year. That's the way it should've been ever since Hansen stepped up.
