Bye bye Sonics

[pscot]

The Seattle Times is reporting that the Seattle Sonics have been sold to an Oklahoma City group. Sam Schulman just rolled over in his grave.

[maxsolomon]

1. link

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/sports/2003135221_websonicssold18.html

read between the lines on this crap sentence:

"In a meeting with team employees this morning, Sonics officials said they were committed to keeping the team in Seattle although they declined to give specifics on how that would happen."

thanks wally. YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK! YOU SUCK!

[oldtime dfl_er]

18. of course they want to move them

The deal is sweeter there, I guess.


http://www.cafepress.com/scarebaby/1648734

[pscot]

2. I haven't felt this bad

since my dog died. I did send an e-mail to Nick Licata wishing him a short and pain-filled political life, but since I no longer get to vote in Seattle elections there's not much I can do to help him into retirement.

[ConsAreLiars]

6. You think giving tax money to the Owners of sports franchises is

"wise"? Subsidizing vanity empires really seems a lot less important to me than filling potholes of improving public services generally, but your priorities may vary, I guess.

[pscot]

3. The Graz on KJR

was speculating that this deal didn't go down overnight, or even in the last few weeks. It takes a while to scare up 350 mil and develope a business plan. One caller said he had heard weeks ago from a contact in New Orleans that the Hornets would not be staying in OKC, because the Sonics were coming to town; it was a "done deal". We've been played like fish; stabbed in the back by a treacherous owner group. Slick business move, big profits all around: the fans? Hey, fuck them. Take the money and run.

[flamingyouth]

4. Oklahoma?

I wonder what kind of ridiculous taxpayer-financed arena they have planned for them there?

I'll miss the Storm, though. :(

[regnaD kciN]

14. They've already got one...

A brand new arena, currently housing the New Orleans Hornets. When the Hornets move back to NO, they need a replacement. Guess who loses? Well, at least we've still got the Huskies.

[MikeNearMcChord]

5. If Oklahoma considers a basketball team, with luxury

seating for the rich, more important than schools or helping those in need
I say knock yourselves out! If Schultz was that hard up for cash, he shouldn't have bought the team, no welfare for billionaires.

[Cascadian]

7. I am that close to saying "The hell with pro sports."

If the Sonics go, and you know they will, I am close to just giving up and not giving a damn. Professional sports in this country is a joke. The idea of franchises to me is a joke. Franchises belong in the fast food world and not sports. The new owner insists they are commited to staying in Seattle. Yeah right.


John

[maxsolomon]

8. then lets say it - screw pro sports

the sonics were the last pro sports team i cared about, and it broke my heart to see wally drive it into the ground with incompetence.

nice PR campaign to get your 200 mil remodel, too. does anyone know what they wanted it to LOOK LIKE? i don't, and i tried to find out multiple times.

nick licata should not be the scapegoat for this - 'no cultural value' is one sentence. he was posturing, establishing a negotiating position, lying; its what politicians do. this falls squarely on schultz.

[Pierzin]

15. Wasn't the Key Just Remodelled and Enlarged Recently???

What more did Howard Schultz want??
The arrogance of these professional sports teams is really beyond the pale.
I don't know where to start on this one! We already have two brand new sports stadiums, both of which were at least partially financed through the public trough. One was for one of the riches men In The World, no less!
The Sonics are acting like a spoiled teenager who got a new Mustang instead of a new Mercedes if you ask me. It will be sad to see them go, for the fans sake, but if it means the state won't have to pay for yet another stadium, Good Riddance!

:shrug: :shrug:

[MikeNearMcChord]

9. Listening to KJR, the blame is being readied for Nick Licata

also the talk is that maybe, OKC/NO Hornets may not go back at all. But I doubt that Oklahoma Investors would buy a team just keep it in Seattle, unless there is some "White Knight" (basketball fan Paul Allen? hell he is in the process of unloading the Blazers. Speaking of White, an observation, most of the callers are white guys who would probably call Kirby Wilbur or John Carlson and bitch about public money going to the inner city or rural poor, or they would scream with the hosts about more money for schools and health care, but mute about welfare for Forbes 400 types and thier Country Club friends. I am a sports fan myself, but sorry, if I am against subsidizing those who have the means to pay for ornate temples of the games. I would love to see more teams owned like they have it in Green Bay, the Packers are owned publically.:rant:

[pscot]

11. The notion that money not spent on an arena

would then be used to fund schools, low income housing and all those other wonderful amenities simply doesn't stand scrutiny. Licata, who essentially told the Sonics to buzz off, is already talking about the need for a $20 million renovation of the arena even if the Sonics leave. He also wants to spend another $150 million on art. This for a city that is already swimming in third rate public art.

Is art somehow nobler and more deserving than sport? That's an elitist conceit. The ancient Greeks didn't believe it. They understood that sport and the arts are two sides of the same cultural coin. Wrestling and foot-racing, Euripides and the Parthenon were all part of the fabric of Greek culture. We're the richest society that's ever infested the planet. We can afford to pound a Trillion dollars down a rathole in Iraq, We can afford trillions more in tax cuts for the rich, funded with money borrowed from the Chinese, but we can't afford what it would cost to sustain a Seattle icon.

The Sonics have been doing business here for 40 years. Guys who played for them years ago, like Freddie Brown, Slick Watts, Jack Sikma, Detlef Schrempf and Lenny Wilkens, great players, have settled here because they feel the Love. (You can leave Wally Walker off the list.) They still cause a stir when they're out in public.The Sonics are still our most successful sports franchise in the City's history. . They are the only one that's ever brought us a championship.

Are we willing to just piss that away because some carpet-bagging sno-job artist sees a chance to make a quick buck and sells us out? Because a hapless mayor and disfunctional city council would rather play who-hit-John than tend to business? If we are, it's a damned shame, and the good citizens of the city I truly love have their heads further up their collective butt than I would have thought possible.

[LisaM]

10. No one ever lost money owning a pro sports franchise

The OKC people could be hedging their bets - if NO can't stay, the Sonics are a good backup for them.

I agree that there should be SOME municipal ownership of sports franchises. I would prefer that it be complete ownership - I like the Green Bay model, which scares owners to death. I don't see how a team can trade on the goodwill of a city for years and years, using its name, its symbols, its trademarks (the Space Needle for one) and the city gets squat when they leave.

Howard Schultz is a jerk anyway. Remember when he bulldozed through a public park to get a private driveway? He's made a cool profit on this deal, as everyone knew he would. To say that he couldn't front operating costs till they could work out a real stadium deal is nonsense. I don't really patronize Starbucks, and I'm glad I don't.

[geniph]

12. I don't get the animosity toward Licata on this

he's only one vote on the council. Why single him out? There were several other councilmembers who agreed that the team's ownership needed to pony up more of the dough than they were offering if they wanted a new gilded palace.

Sports team sales take time. You can't tell me they came up with this one in the last week; the Sonics' ownership have clearly been working on this with the OKC group for months, all the while offering their penny-ante $18 million for their demanded $250 million upgrade - they never had any intention of keeping the ownership here unless they could bend the local taxpayers over the nearest conference table.

[regnaD kciN]

13. I campaigned for Safeco Field, I voted for Qwest Field...

...but this past year's shakedown by the Sonics was too much even for me.

It isn't so much that the team wanted/needed renovations to Key Arena. It's that this was the second time in ten years. In the '90s, the Seattle Center Coliseum was essentially gutted, excavated thirty feet deep, and a brand-new arena was built, primarily at public expense, within the frame. I was at the grand opening gala in autumn 1995. Barely ten years later, the Sonics started whining about how Key Arena was "horribly inadequate," and needed a second rebuild worth $220 million...this time, virtually entirely out of the taxpayer pocket.

It got worse. The Sonics stalled on presenting a financing proposal to the state legislature until there was no time to consider it this year...then rushed in a half-baked proposal at the last minute, demanding immediate approval "or else." When that, understandably, got nowhere, NBA commissioner Stern announced that it was "obvious that the people of Seattle don't want an NBA franchise." (This was the city that sold out Sonics games for year after year, that went into a collective mania each year at playoff time -- back in the days before Howard Schultz, when the team made the playoffs every year -- and leaving the other pro sports franchises grumbling that they couldn't make it because Seattle was only a "basketball town.")

Just a couple of weeks ago, the Sonics were quoted in a story as saying that they were back into negotiations with the city and state, having realized that they made a mistake in setting ultimatums, and vowing a more civil, reasoned approach toward dealing with public officials. This was the "party line" until yesterday morning, when the sale to OKC was announced as a "done deal."

This whole thing has to rank as the most underhanded maneuvering I have seen since moving here. The Mariners and Seahawks were also extremely hard-nosed and ruthless in getting public officials to commit tax dollars to their benefit, but I have never before seen a "negotiation" strategy that seemed specifically designed to fail, so that the owners could wash their hands of the situation.

Steve Kelley put it well in today's column: Well, at least we now know what Howard Schultz's "five-year plan" was. When he bought the team, Schultz promised the city of Seattle an NBA championship in five years. Five years later, he sold out the city for $350 million.

[maxsolomon]

16. response from the Oklahoma board:

POSTERS RESPONSE TO MY OK INSULT:

Ya know, what's a bit ironic about this kind of reaction is that the team has been purchased by a group headed by a guy who, assuming it moves to OKC, is planning on modeling the Sonics after his experiences on the board of directors with the Spurs. And what that means is spread out ownership among people who have hard and deep ties to the community in which the team will be headquartered, thus reducing the possibility of it being sold away to someone or some group of someones from another city that want to move it. You can blame Mr. "Starbucks" if you really need to let off some steam. *He* sold the Sonics, and if a group from OKC hadn't bought it, someone else would have.

The problem with the Sonics, from a business perspective, is that Seattle as a whole doesn't support the team. Maybe you do, and for you, I'm truly sorry. But remember that your city does have a chance to keep the team. I simply doubt that doing so is among the mayor's and the Washington legislature's priorities at the moment.

OKC, who hosted the Hornets last year with no expectation of having the team around for more than a year, supported that team better than New Orleans had...ever. I remember vividly the day the members of the team started showing up in OKC and moving into their temporary housing. I met several of them and helped them set up some essential services in their apartments. They were floored by the welcome they received. One stated to me (off the record in a "if you say I said this I'll deny it because I'll end up being the most hated man in NO because of it" way) that he was completely annoyed at having to play in OKC, until he got here and found so many people so welcoming and so willing to accept him as a part of the community, and now he didn't want to leave and go back to a place where he was booed more often than he was cheered. He'd played his first game here by then and noted that the roar of the crowd was so uplifting, so unlike what he'd experienced in NO, that he'd decided then and there that he'd been completely wrong about OKC.

Half way through the year, with a team performing slightly above average, attendance at the games was ranking up there with long-established teams with heavy support from their host cities. OKC, the town too small to support a pro franchise, was beating out cities with better teams and populations three times the size. The group that bought the Sonics actually wanted the Hornets, but the owner is refusing to sell. Good on him, for the people of New Orleans, who very much need that kind of faith and commitment. Had your owner had the same determination, you wouldn't be here blaming Okies.

MY RESPONSE:

I read that your Hornets season tickets were subsidized and offered at reduced rates. Is that true?

"The problem with the Sonics, from a business perspective, is that Seattle as a whole doesn't support the team." I don't think you know Seattle very well. The Sonics have been here 39 years, and with the exception of the recent Wally Walker drive-the-team-into-the-ground-with-incompetence era, have been loved & supported as well as any team in the NBA.

The demands & negotiating stance of the Schultz-led Sonics were unreasonable, and backed up by poor timing, insults, and stonewalling. No citizen in Seattle ever believed a word they said about remodelled-10-years-ago Key Arena being substandard, or even saw the remodel plans. The City GUTTED the place 10 years ago, lowered the floor by 30', and rebuilt the whole thing new. To accuse the Governor, County, Mayor & Council of not wanting to retain the team, after they bent over for, in order, the Sonics, the Mariners, and the Seahawks, the latter two who also played the 'we're leaving unless' card, has left us with prosports fatigue.

Seattle is getting fucked, plain & simple. By the NBA, by David Stern, by Howard Schultz, & by Clayton Bennett wanting a backup in case George Shinn is as much of a flake as he appears. I don't think OKC needs TWO teams.

The most insulting part is that they just lie straight in your face - like the Bush Administration.

[Wash. state Desk Jet]

17. City planners,

don,t seem to work well with investers. Remember when they almost threw away Pikes Market.

Rapid grouth as it is, it seems the politicans are lagging . How do the other big citys do it.

Homing professional sports teams is also good for international business. And a place to mix business with pleasure.
The finnal deal in it,s closure.

Have any idea how many Dodger hats there are around in the world? NY too.

[puffthemagicdragon]

19. Seattle is a city that moves backwards

Sorry to all you natives but Seattle insists on moving backwards. Yes, let's NOT have more mass transit options. Yes, let's get rid of nightclubs. Yes, let's wine about the skyline growing. Yes, let's close schools....and MY FAVORITE...let's get rid of the oldest sports club in the city - the NBA. Now that is what I call progress. I moved here many years ago to experience a city that grows and moves with the times, I assumed that Seattle was about progression. I am very disappointed that the Seattle team was sold and IRONICALLY by a guy that got rich off this city. ugh

[maxsolomon]

20. the scandinavian spendthrift legacy of "lesser seattle"

in many many ways it is a city filled with conservative, in the original sense of the word, people.

i'm not 100% convinced the city isn't doing the right thing by calling BS on the Sonics & the NBA. certainly the Sea Times sunday sports section had some eye-popping reading on the lease issue, the proposed 200 mil remodel to the Key (500 addtional seats), the economics of the NBA, the city's offers & the sonics half assed counter offers (calling their proposed contribution '1/3 of a calvin booth'), and blame for everyone including the Ackerleys. the ridiculous salaries of the NBA are in large part responsible for the situation.

radical change frightens the oldsters, and modern medicine is keeping them alive to vote well into their dotages. it is up to change agents to listen to their concerns, and then (as GWB does) say "i understand", & then ignore them.

SURFACE SOLUTION.

[geniph]

21. I actually doubt we'll lose the Sonics

Paul Allen bought the Trailblazers, although it was the Sonics he'd wanted; at the time, they weren't for sale. My prediction: Paul Allen works a deal with the new ownership, the Jailblazers move to Okie City, the Hornets go back to NOLA, and the Sonics, after Allen buys 'em, stay right here.

Now if Allen will just cough up a fair share for their golden palace instead of expecting us to finance it, that'll be fine. For what it's worth, I have no real problem financing stadiums with hotel and restaurant taxes, as people who live here can choose whether or not to patronize hotels and restaurants within the city.

[rhett o rick]

22. Good Riddance. Pro sports are no longer sports but now entertainment

The outcomes are orchestrated, like last years super bowl. The owners make hundreds of millions of dollars, the players make many 10's of millions and the fans get screwed. The cost per game when you consider stadium costs are outrageous and taxpayers other than fans get stuck with part of the bill. Pro sports is a huge ripoff. Wake up sports fans.