Good god, are we gonna have to see another awkward exchange between Stern and Daniels tomorrow?

Chris Daniels ‏@ChrisDaniels5 57s
Spotted in hotel lobby: NBA Commish David Stern and George Maloof having serious discussion. #NBAKings

Dale Kasler ‏@dakasler 13m
David stern and George Maloof have been chatting for quite a few minutes in a sitting area off the lobby. That's your mid morning update

Sounds like George Maloof & David Stern have been chopping it up this morning.

They were meeting with a third person, one of the NBA's lawyers

Jason Puckett ‏@JasonPuckettKJR 36s
Interesting site at the hotel where David Stern sat and chatted with George Maloof and another unidentified man for 45 minutes. #NBABOG

A hitman?

I think this is a definite sign that the NBA is going to cave and avoid litigation by guaranteeing HBN an Expansion team for the '14-'15 season. We probably won't hear the announcement tomorrow, but it will be coming soon.

That's the NBA's only exit strategy - because HBN are poised to scorch the earth in Sacto and in Court. The only way the NBA saves their sweet public $$ subsidy deal in Sacto is by giving HBN what they want.

Now, I have no doubt this info was deliberately spoon-fed to Montemayor by someone in the the NBA (who probably got the script straight from Stern) - but why? First of all, we know that it's BS. What are the 2 things Stern has consistently said during this whole process? 1) Expansion's not on the table. 2) One of the cities is going to walk away disappointed. Now we're supposed to believe that expansion's always been an option H/B/N knew about? Yeah, right - doesn't even pass the smell test. And secondly, we know that HBN were working closely with the NBA to make the initial offer for the Kings and that the League pre-approved - so it's obvious that HBN was told all along that if they wanted a team they had to take an existing one

But from a PR standpoint, there's no way the NBA is going to admit that HBN bent them over a rail and leveraged a team from them. So this is the story they'll create to spin it ... Everyone dislikes the Maloofs already, so just throw them under the bus some more and blame all the complications on them. Say the only reason HBN fought for the Kings is because they were being conned by the Maloofs. Paint Stern as the master negotiator who was able to step in and sort everything out.

The NBA will act like "Oh, we were always going to do expansion, it's just those stupid Maloofs led HBN astray and got them mixed up with the Kings ..." when the truth of the matter is that Stern just thought he could keep HBN in play to extract new arenas from Sacto, Milwaukee, etc, but it blew up in his face and HBN just curb-stomped him.

The only question I have about this possible scenario is, who is going to make the Maloofs whole? I doubt the SAC group has close to enough money to match Hansen's most recent bid. Are they just going to relent and take the SAC offer so the SEA group will be open for expansion?

Tony Stark and Rhodey just showed up, ready to dole out some justice.

HAHAHAHA, that's awesome!

From there to here, from here to there, EARL THOMAS is everywhere...