Sonics

Sonics to stay in Sacramento

Published May 15, 2013 | By Madison McCord | Posted in Sonics

This sight will be seen again — just not right now.

The city of Seattle didn’t lose today — the city of Sacramento won.

There’s nothing that the fantastic ownership group of Chris Hansen and Steve Ballmer could have done differently in their quest to bring the NBA back to the Emerald City today.

The goal of getting the Sonics back in town was defeated a month ago when the Sacramento group lead by billionaire Vivek Ranadive did what the NBA asked of them — match the Seattle offer.

But there still seemed to a be a glimmer of hope in Sonics fan’s eyes, especially when Lord Hansen raised the offer to buy the team from the Maloof family for far more than Ranadive will last week. Even then though, we all knew how the vote would end today.

In fact, I was surprised to hear that eight owners voted for the relocation — my money was on a near-unanimous decision, not a 22-8 split.

But now the focus is how to move on. Commissioner David Stern made it clear that any talk of expansion won’t happen until the end of the current television deal in 2015-16, and even then a new team in Seattle is far from guaranteed.

Another option is finding another team that is in a poor market and is just cash strapped enough to want to sell — because the one thing the fans of the Sonics must know is that the Hansen/Ballmer group will not quit until a team is back in Seattle.

And finally there’s still the hope that the Maloof’s keep their word and don’t sell the team to the Ranadive group, sell 20 percent of the team to Hansen (after an NBA approval), sit and wait for Sacramento to bail… Continue reading →

Bad news for future Sonics could be great news for future Sonics

Published April 29, 2013 | By Casey McLain | Posted in Sonics

Update 6:15 — This tweet from Tony Bizjak, a writer for the Sacramento Bee.

The bid to move Kings to Seattle – for this year – was rejected today, but no vote on sale. It seems the Hansen group is still in play.

— Tony Bizjak (@TonyBizjak) April 30, 2013

6:03 PM — A good thing happened today. A city with no other major professional sports franchise kept their team. A fan base with nearly 30 years of history kept their team. A good thing happened today.

By now the news has circulated through most outlets that the chances of the Sacramento Kings moving to Seattle took a major hit today when the relocation committee recommended that the Kings remain in Sacramento, and not move to Seattle. The rest of the NBA owners must vote on this, but historically such a vote has been little more than a formality.

For many fans this has become a debate of the merits of Seattle and Sacramento as cities. The problem with that attitude is that the cities aren’t on a level playing field. The cities aren’t duking it out for an expansion team. Rather, they’re duking it out for something that belonged to Sacramento last year. They’re duking it out over something that has belonged to Sacramento for 28 years. Most importantly though, Sacramento is facing what most Sonics fans thought was inevitable for Seattle five years ago: an infinite amount of time with no NBA team.

Seattle didn’t get bested today. They were just not the beneficiaries of a really bad thing.

This doesn’t mean that Seattle is out of the NBA picture. For NBA owners to turn down a $525 million valuation of a struggling team, with a solid arena plan in place in any city is pretty powerful, and… Continue reading →

About the Seattle Mariners buying controlling interest in ROOT Sports Northwest

Published April 16, 2013 | By Casey McLain | Posted in Mariners, Sonics

For the past several years the Mariners and their fans have been forced to sit back as their competitors and relative contemporaries signed enormous television contracts with cable sports networks. Mariners fans set 2015 as a marker for when the team would be able to cash in themselves, they had an opt-out clause in their contract with ROOT Sports, and they have neglected to make substantial gains to their payroll in recent years.

That all may have changed today as the Mariners bought a controlling interest in Root Sports Northwest. Instead of waiting for their contract to end and auctioning their television rights off to another company, they’ve bought the right to write off a large portion of their television revenue from revenue sharing, effectively taking money out of their wallet and inserting it into their right-front pocket.

Perhaps the most important dynamic in this whole story though, is what is going on with Chris Hansen and his attempts to bring an NBA team back to Seattle. The Mariners have been against the return of the Sonics, but this may be a sign they’ve resigned to the return’s imminence, and are now looking to make a buck off it.

Purchasing a regional sports network (RSN) isn’t exactly risk free for the Mariners. The Pac-12 Network has removed a large portion of the network’s college coverage, and the city’s only other major professional sport is the Seahawks who are subject to the NFL’s national television deal. The Sounders have a substantial following, but their following combined with their relatively short schedule may not make them a viable partner to fill other air time.

The remaining options are the eventual Supersonics, and a prospective NHL team, both of which will have considerable influence from the Hansen-Ballmer-Nordstrom ownership group. The chances that the… Continue reading →

Royal Brougham Cast Episode 1: Comedian Kris Brannon, also known as Sonics Guy

Published March 11, 2013 | By Casey McLain | Posted in Podcasts, Sonics

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In this week’s episode, the inaugural re-branded episode, Mark and Casey talk to Kris about his comedy, and talk about shopping carts at Costco, and how the people pushing them are ruining the image of Tacoma.

Follow Kris at @Sonicsguy and follow Mark at @MarkinPerson

Robert Swift’s Former House in Sammamish is Icky

Published March 5, 2013 | By Casey McLain | Posted in Sonics

I remember the day that Robert Swift got drafted. He was a dorky looking, red-headed, lanky seven-footer out of Bakersfield, California. I’ve never been to Bakersfield, but as an avid Loveline listener growing up, Adam Carolla had poisoned the well in terms of my opinion of Swift’s hometown.

As Swift began to add dozens of tattoos to his body, we laughed at him.

Well, he may be from the meth-soaked Bakersfield from my imagination, indeed.

The video says that Swift’s home was foreclosed on, and that Swift recently left his former Sammamish home facing threat of eviction.

Swift left dog feces, guns, bullets, empty beer bottles, and some random keepsakes from a career gone south in the house, which is the main story in the video.

The video also says that Swift was supposed to be Seattle’s “savior.” That’s certainly not true, and it’s a bit perplexing that Swift is in such a bad way financially considering the $11+ million he made according to Basketball Reference.