On Thursday, billionaire Paul Allen, who owns the NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers and the Seattle Seahawks of the NFL, wrote basketball commissioner David Stern a love note when he released a statement essentially saying he would support an NBA team in Seattle provided the economics of a new building for the team made sense.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/mikeozanian ... love-note/

New links on the Arena deal:

Video of the Man himself, Chris Hansen. People have compared him to Mark Cuban. He is NO Mark Cuban. He looks uncomfortable being on camera, just as I've heard. He prefers to be a "behind the scenes" kinda guy. Kinda like I'd be if I were fabulously wealthy.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/flatpa ... 5135829001

New Seattle times links:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/l ... na19m.html

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/l ... na18m.html

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/r ... udd19.html

Sacramento Bee:

http://www.sacbee.com/2012/02/19/427482 ... entos.html

Even if the Phoenix Coyotes get new ownership that keeps them in Phoenix there are still a lot of options. The Dallas Stars could be intriguing. They're failing in Dallas, and the new owner, Tom Gaglardi, is a Vancouver guy that felt cheated when he didn't get ownership of the Canucks. I bet he would love to get his team in Seattle and go toe-to-toe with Vancouver. Plus, Dallas comes with a young superstar from the northwest -Jamie Benn- on the roster.

Seattle City Council Member Sally Bagshaw, who said some incredibly ignorant comments on KJR last week just tweeted this:

If we got a new #Seattlearena, would u be a season ticket holder? If so, would it be plus existing tickets, or would u drop a sport? Thx!

https://twitter.com/#!/sallybagshaw/sta ... 8681108480

If you support and want a new arena, let her know you do! She's under the impression that sports fans pick a sport and "drop" others. If you don't have Twitter, call her at 206-684-8801.

In fact, if the arena or Sonics are important to you, call or email all of the city council members. There's been A LOT of misleading opinions from the anti-sports people and vague reporting going on that's leading the average citizen to think that the arena is being paid by taxpayer money. Call the council, let them hear your voice. Here's the info:

http://www.seattle.gov/council/councilcontact.htm

@sallybagshaw @Sonicsgate #seattlearena 10-,12-,16-game package no question to #Sonics basketball; I'm a 8-year #seahawks ticket holder.

My tweet to Sally.

I will say that she brings up valid points that non-sports people should bring up in the conversation. Now, she did come off incredibly ignorant on 710 when she basically said that the proposal, even in its current form, does not offer real guarantees. She brought up the fact that the Sonics were locked into an unbreakable lease before breaking it.

Now, her assumptions are totally wrong. I firmly believe that teams make more money off TV rights than ticket sales, so it's a non-factor in my opinion. That doesn't mean that people will drop sport A for sport B. Usually it's a reallocation of funds instead of just dropping a sport all together.

What I like is that this will become a hot political topic which will force lots of people to join it or draw a line in the sand.

Pretty brilliant survey. 1500 anonymous subjects? Perfect

whats bugging me is this lady is asking people like they're kids or something and shes our parent. Like its a dog and her questions are like "Will you pick up its poop if it does??", "will you walk it everyday?", kind of degrading IMO. Hey lady, just do your job and bring some more money to the region you chump.

No I don't have enough money for season tickets, but if I did? you bet your sweet ass i'd be at 41 home games a season along with playoff games. But right now? making the BS money I make now, I can go to 4-5 games a year like I did in 07, and 08 before the city of Seattle ruined it.

This lady is really bugging me, wasn't she the piece of work worried about traffic too and events over lapping like the mariners would ever be good enough to make the WS?

Yeah, throwdown. Same lady.

She's under the impression that adding sports teams is going to categorically hurt the other teams. That there is a finite amount of sports dollars. That's bs. Everyone knows that it's about the product on the field that determines fan support. The Mariners attendance has been dropping with only one other pro sports team in town (sorry Smurf, I don't count Minor League Soccer).

You win, they go. Not to mention not all sports fans like all sports! There are a lot of people out there that like basketball or hockey, who would be going to those games that do not currently go to a ton of M's, Hawks, or Sounders games.

There is a real market for hockey and basketball in this area. Basketball has 41 years of proof. The Supes were the most consistently supported Seattle sports team up until the last couple years where Carpetbagger Clay ran them into the ground. And there is a considerable hockey base with a couple junior league teams that draw quite well. Not to mention proximity to Canada. Canadian hockey fans are obsessed enough that they will travel 2-3 hours to see a game.

Does having more professional sports teams put more pressure on them to put a good product on the field? Most definitely. And I think that's a good thing. You put out a product like the Mariners have for the past decade, you deserve to have your attendance drop.

SeaTown81 wrote:You put out a product like the Mariners have for the past decade, you deserve to have your attendance drop.

AMEN to that, the M's need something to compete with so they will actually give a crap and start to try to win. I do like what Jack Z is trying to do but you can still see they are the same old Mariners in the way the team operates a lot of the time, I'm afraid they will get a little better and that's it.

Looks like the Kings are most likely staying in Cali

http://www.king5.com/sports/Kings-signi ... 99263.html

Sacramento's last shot to remain an NBA city appears headed for another overtime, at the same time dealing a major blow to Seattle's hopes of once again hosting an NBA franchise.

In a joint statement released Wednesday, Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson and NBA Commissioner David Stern said they have agreed to a "work plan" in hopes of reaching a deal to finance a new arena by the March 1 deadline. Johnson, Stern and the Maloof family, which owns the Sacramento Kings, will meet during this weekend's All-Star festivities in Orlando, Fla.

If a plan can been hammered out in time, a term sheet will be announced March 1 and the Sacramento City Council will vote on the plan at its March 6 meeting.

I knew it, I knew it.........just when I get my hopes up for a team returning to Seattle my hopes get stomped on.....

I'm pissedified...

I like how the people in Sacramento get chance after chance after chance AFTER CHANCE!

But when it came to Seattle where was the same courtesy? hell we didn't even get ONE chance.

Hornets are reportedly about to be sold locally with a long-term lease as well. At that point we're probably talking at least a couple years before another team is really on the verge of relocation and interest in the arena project could very well have faded by then.

Hate to say it but good for Sacramento. I don't want to see teams leave unless the city let's them. Obviously there is enough interest there to keep them.

We shouldn't focus on them. Our first step is to get the arena deal done. Once that is in place then we can focus on getting a team.

If Sacramento doesn't get the arena funded then we will be ready to roll. If they do then I am sure we will look very appealing to another struggling franchise.

My Tapatalk was first.

Tech, by getting the deal done do you mean getting the OK from the 'arena board' or whatever they're called?

pinksheets wrote:Tech, by getting the deal done do you mean getting the OK from the 'arena board' or whatever they're called?

We have to to have the go ahead from the city and the county before they will issue the $200 million in bonds. Now that won't happen, the issuing of the bonds, until a team is secured but we have to at least get them to agree to issue them.

My Tapatalk was first.

Tech Worlds wrote:We shouldn't focus on them. Our first step is to get the arena deal done. Once that is in place then we can focus on getting a team.

If Sacramento doesn't get the arena funded then we will be ready to roll. If they do then I am sure we will look very appealing to another struggling franchise.

PRECISELY!

And for the record. Nothing is settled in Sacramento or Phoenix. Until it is, it's all media masturbation and mediots jumping the gun. Reports in both cases say there are still final hurdles that remain.

And like Tech says. Even if those places work their stuff out, and good for them on it, none of it matters if we don't get our crap in order and taken care of. That is what matters. We get our arena deal approved and ready to go, things will eventually work themselves out. Maybe not as quickly as we'd all like. But they will. They won't if our local government drops the ball and blows the deal or let's nonsense get in the way.

I dunno man. Everything I've been hearing on local news radio has been so negative. They were basically saying how fans in Sac, N.O. and Phoenix are saying "Thank you SO much Seattle for lighting a fire under our local government and teams to get something done!". And that is exactly what it looks like. Pisses me off. We had a blueprint from the A-hole in OK on how to stealth-steal a team, and we didn't follow it. We should have had local interest look like they wanted to buy the team to keep it in X city, then let the team suck, get the attendance down, then move 'em on out! All we did was invigorate the locals with our slavering over their teams. Oh well. It was fun while it lasted. I still have a whiff of optimism, but it seems to fade a little more each day.

I rather us do it the way we are. With dignity. I wouldn't want to have to live with what Clay did to us.

This just in:

mitch levy ‏ @kjrmitch Reply Retweet Favorite · Open
Spoke with someone w/inside knowledge of the Sacramento situation and he said, "Really could go either way." "Truly a toss up."
Retweeted by Danny Kelly

Breaking: Six of one, half dozen of the other. It's a long way from over, folks.

-shrug- I still hold the faith haha.

In this climate political change coming people will say yes and no at the same time. Kevin Johnson I would think will use every favor he has on the NBA side to get as much room as possible to allow the political engine to work,having Stern on his side vs our situation where Nickels was a butting heads with him makes for a whole different playing field.

Why does Kevin Durant make it so hard to hate him? I want to so bad but the dude says right stuff all the time...

http://www.king5.com/sports/Durant-on-S ... 83643.html

Hate that team though, we don't know have no conections to the other clowns on that squad.

I hate the Thundner and and Bennett but harbor no I'll will or hard feelings towards any player.

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk

Vote in this poll!

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/s ... st_20.html

i officially do not believe anything that Stern is talking about right now regarding ANYTHING!

Hornets able to move to Anaheim huh?

http://www.ocbj.com/news/2012/feb/24/oc ... w-orleans/

Throwdown wrote:i officially do not believe anything that Stern is talking about right now regarding ANYTHING!

Hornets able to move to Anaheim huh?

http://www.ocbj.com/news/2012/feb/24/oc ... w-orleans/

Wow........just smh.

Throwdown wrote:i officially do not believe anything that Stern is talking about right now regarding ANYTHING!

Hornets able to move to Anaheim huh?

http://www.ocbj.com/news/2012/feb/24/oc ... w-orleans/

That would make 5 teams in California, with 3 in L.A..... And not even one in the entire state of Washington? WTF is wrong with the idiots running this league? Seriously. I hope Stern has a severe (and painful) myocardial infarction (I know, it's only sports, but I really hate the guy). Why does he hate Seattle so much? His personal bias against our great city is costing the whole league money from not tapping the 12th largest market in the U.S. He's just such an idiot!

Where in that article does it say anything about the team moving to Anaheim?

they could.

But I guess Hanson has met with Stern about 2 weeks ago. Just reading through the Sonicsgate twitter.

Word is Kevin Johnson, the Maloofs, and the NBA have worked out an arena deal. Before everyone freaks out and thinks that ends things (as is already taking place around the internet, of course), this was always going to happen> KJ didn't go down there to not come up with an agreement to present the Sacramento city council. Keep in mind this is no more a done deal than the arena proposal in Seattle. As of now, it's just a proposed plan. The city council still has to review the deal and vote on it.

For all we know they might say no to selling the city's parking, which the entire deal centers around. Not to mention the other aspects of the agreement between KJ and the league. There is a long way still to go between now and the March 6 vote. It might work out and pass. But it's no sure thing.

It's rumored that the Maloofs are contributing up to $70 million in this plan. But it remains to be seen if that number includes the $50 million AEG contribution that Stern the other day said the league considered to be on the owners' behalf. Which flew in the face of what KJ and the city was thinking. They were expecting $70-90 mil from the Maloofs plus the $50 mil from AEG. So there's a lot of details to remain to be known. Did KJ, who is as invested in this thing as any mayor could ever be, have to make consessions to the league and Maloofs to make up some of that ground? Will the city council approve, if so? Like I said, we'll know a lot more come March 6. Not now.

And regardless of what happens there, as long as we get our arena plan approved by the city council... teams will come.

Doesn't matter what happens elsewhere, as long as Seattle gets their arena in place, there will be plenty of other NBA and NHL teams looking to move, looking for a new arena to play in. I'm not worried about that.

Build it and they will come. Maybe not the Kings, maybe not the Coyotes, but some other teams in the future.

twisted_steel2 wrote:And regardless of what happens there, as long as we get our arena plan approved by the city council... teams will come.

Doesn't matter what happens elsewhere, as long as Seattle gets their arena in place, there will be plenty of other NBA and NHL teams looking to move, looking for a new arena to play in. I'm not worried about that.

Build it and they will come. Maybe not the Kings, maybe not the Coyotes, but some other teams in the future.

Exactly.

And on the other side of the coin, if we mess up this Hansen proposal and let the naysayers and city council let it slide by, good luck ever seeing an arena or teams in the city ever. So yeah, we need to focus on what we can control. Sure, until a team is available, nothing will happen. But without the deal in place, ready and waiting, NOTHING will ever happen.

Just makes me think there's a reason my Hansen was so reluctant to come out with this publicly. Seattle is a huge threat to many of these cities trying to keep their teams. If the city council does its part, we are a lock for a team to relocate here.

Yipee, now we just have to wait even longer for a team to return to Seattle.....

I too wanted instant gratification, but I think we're just gonna have to be more patient than I was hoping for. For some reason I get the feeling that the prospect of both teams having to play in Key Arena for a couple years may be a sticking point with both leagues. They really hate that arena for some reason.

If this deal hinged on the Kings, or the Kings were the intended centerpiece, we would have never announced like we did.

A) The risk would be huge in getting up Seattle fans' hopes in such an unlikely scenario.
B) By holding the press conference we put Sacramento's politicians on the spot. If anything, the announcement of our proposed arena helped Sacramento keep the Kings. There was a very clear destination for that team if a deal isn't/wasn't worked out, not a vague threat of leaving, but a city about to build the type of arena their team wants. 'No' was made definitely not an option by this city.

Like I initially thought, NBA here next year was a stretch, fun to imagine though wasnt it?

We need that arena though.

Chris Hansen released a statement saying that his plan is not and was not contingent on the Kings. He's thinking much bigger, grand scheme here. He didn't buy all that land just for a shot in the dark chance at one specific team. Fans obviously got excited and are impatient. But this is a much longer term deal. Everyone just relax.

If you're interested in the issue and cause in general. I can't recommend enough checking out http://www.SonicsCentral.com. It's sort of the Seahawks.Net for the Supes, and has been home to the Save Our Sonics people ever since the whole Clay Bennett thing began. Pretty cool that it's continued to run all this time. If you're ever curious as to what's going on, it's the place to check out. They're always ahead of the rest of the internet in terms of what's going on and what exactly is happening. If you read that site, everything else you read in the media looks misinformed. Great site.

The latest news centers around Bellevue entering the arena discussion. Not that I'd want it there over SODO by any means. As well as I would hate to see Hansen's plan ignored and Hansen out of the equation. But Bellevue making their interest known is a good thing. It puts pressure on Seattle to not blow this proposed deal. If Seattle goofs around and gets fussy, Bellevue could be ready to swoop in and steal all that future business. I'd take Bellevue as a site for an arena if it was impossible in SODO. But more than anything right now, they're best as a kick in the pants to Seattle to get it's crap together and not take Hansen's offer for granted.

I'm not sure if it's similar to what the Hansen guy is doing, but I hear the city of Sacramento has to give at least 200+ million to fund the new stadium. That could be a potential deal-breaker there.

Beast Mode wrote:I'm not sure if it's similar to what the Hansen guy is doing, but I hear the city of Sacramento has to give at least 200+ million to fund the new stadium. That could be a potential deal-breaker there.

SAC is really getting screwed in the deal. I wouldn't be surprised if they voted down the proposal. The NBA obviously doesn't want to be in Sacramento.

hawky wrote:

Beast Mode wrote:I'm not sure if it's similar to what the Hansen guy is doing, but I hear the city of Sacramento has to give at least 200+ million to fund the new stadium. That could be a potential deal-breaker there.

SAC is really getting screwed in the deal. I wouldn't be surprised if they voted down the proposal. The NBA obviously doesn't want to be in Sacramento.

If they can't even get an NFL stadium in LA, then I doubt it'll ever happen either. It sucks that Sacramento might lose their team, but I guess this is how the NBA works now.

If it helps us get the Sonics back, then I'm all for it. I could care less about Sacramento.

Beast Mode wrote:

hawky wrote:

Beast Mode wrote:I'm not sure if it's similar to what the Hansen guy is doing, but I hear the city of Sacramento has to give at least 200+ million to fund the new stadium. That could be a potential deal-breaker there.

SAC is really getting screwed in the deal. I wouldn't be surprised if they voted down the proposal. The NBA obviously doesn't want to be in Sacramento.

If they can't even get an NFL stadium in LA, then I doubt it'll ever happen either. It sucks that Sacramento might lose their team, but I guess this is how the NBA works now.

If it helps us get the Sonics back, then I'm all for it. I could care less about Sacramento.

LA is the worst sports town anyways.

with the arena vote in sacramento going through last night (i think they just need to square the parking lot one now...not overly sure) and the quebecois government putting aside money to refurbish the colisee pepsi for next season (quebec city's nhl arena) the time is now to act for that new seattle stadium. i know it takes time to put this shit together but it seriously needs to be figured out by april/may when the coyotes are done playing (hopefully one and done in the playoffs) to see where they are going to be playing next year. some dude is rumored to want to buy them and keep them locally but ill believe that when i see it. with the quebec arena getting fixed up and a new one being built, if they snake that nhl team that puts you guys behind the 8 ball even worse than with the sacramento kings situation IMO because they are pretty much the only team relocating anytime soon in the league (at least basketball has a few options)

http://prohockeytalk.nbcsports.com/2012 ... rbishment/

Question, Do the Milwaukee Bucks have any fans? I saw the highlights of Brandon Jennings going off on the sixers and there was literally like 6 fans in the crowd. Can we have them?

im going to watch him play on sunday buddy, after i ask him to demand a trade to play with his boy demar ill see what the story is on the bucks and their fans...and yes you can have them, all the locals seem to care about are the packers and defending ryan braun's honor!

New Orleans is the team I would want. With 2 lottery picks next year we could have out next Payton and Kemp right away and hopefully help us forget Durant.

as long they didn't keep Eric Gordon, I'd be happy. I don't like undersized SG's, kind of a pet peeve of mine.

slybry75 wrote:New Orleans is the team I would want. With 2 lottery picks next year we could have out next Payton and Kemp right away and hopefully help us forget Durant.

David Stern would have to die before he lets the Hornets leave N.O

Seriously, the guy has put his foot down at every possible outcome that has someone buying the team and moving it.

Too bad Adam Silver is a snake as well because he has been groomed for the last 10 years to become the new dictator of the NBA.

Man this event sure slowed down rather quickly. I need more news now!