INGLEWOOD- NBA Commissioner Adam Silver is against expanding the league to 32 teams. For now.
Citing “parity” amongst the leagues current owners, he believes the math doesn’t support decreasing revenue to increase the number of teams.
If you expand, the way I think of the league, the 30 teams, there are 30 shareholders, and you are really selling equity. Let’s say, if you were to expand by an even number, the extent you are growing, things get divided by 1/32 instead of 1/30.”
Even with all the very best players in the world coming to this league [NBA], a game played by tens of millions of kids around the world, you still don’t have the kind of competitive parity that we would like. And if you expand, you’re diluting talent even more.
Meanwhile, he doesn’t rule out a team in either Las Vegas or Seattle.
There’s no doubt Seattle would be a great market. Las Vegas would be a great market. There’s state-of-the-art arenas in both those communities, and so we’ll look at it … it’s not on the front burner for our league right now.”
Meanwhile, the chatter surrounding the return of the NBA to Seattle, continues to increase, with Gary Payton leading the charge.
Seattle, in particular, deserves another NBA team: the city is one of the most basketball-hungry areas in the US. Bringing back the SuperSonics to the league would be righting the wrongs made in the past of moving the team away from that city.
Gerard Samillano, clutchpoints.com
All the time, all the time,” Payton enthusiastically told FanSided. “He (Silver) is trying his best. Everybody’s gotta understand it’s not that easy to just get a team back. Either we’re gonna have to get a team from somewhere else and relocate them. I don’t think Adam is trying to do that. The next thing is can we do expansion? These the owners have to agree to it. 30 owners have to agree to this
STEVE BALLMER / LA CLIPPERS
Seattle fans continue to check in with 2UrbanGirls on the status of construction of the $2 billion Intuit Dome, Steve Ballmer is building in the city of Inglewood.
Ballmer negotiated a land deal totaling nearly $70 million, although Inglewood hasn’t received a dime from it. According to Mayor James T. Butts, the funds go to outside entities since their funds were used to acquire the parcels.
The project reached an impasse when legislation stalled when the California Air Resources Board didn’t believe the project met the necessary environmental standards. One caveat is a state mandated law that both Ballmer and the City must adhere to.
INGLEWOOD TRANSIT CONNECTOR
In late 2018, a year before then Gov. Jerry Brown signed off on AB 987, Mayor Butts proposed a transit connector to link the Crenshaw/LAX rail line to the Forum, SoFi Stadium, and the Clippers Arena. Metro wasn’t interested in helping pay for it, but ultimately formed a joint powers authority to assist Inglewood with financing the project.
The City proposed two tax increase measures to voters in November, with one passing and the other being rejected. Ballmer pledged $10,000 towards the measures passing.
The city met the requirements of AB 987 with approving the EIR connected to the project before 2025, and will be held to a strict transportation demand management program which includes an enhanced infrastructure consisting of measures to reduce emissions from traffic congestion.
During the approval of the transit connector, during the April 19 city council meeting, consultants acknowledged the project is only 30% funded. They expect the mayor, like other mayors around the nation, to travel to Washington to secure federal dollars to meet the funding shortage. Rep. Maxine Waters chairs the powerful House Committee on Financial Services, but residents can’t recall she allowed herself to be in a photo with Butts since he publicly came for our treasurer.
Conventional wisdom tells us that Ballmer’s project could be in jeopardy if the City can’t get the funding to get the transit connector built. Butts is knee deep in lawsuits, and is preparing to sit for a deposition by his ex aides high profile legal team.
Related: Inglewood’s approval of LA Clippers arena project broke the law, DA says
Butts, in essence, has kind of created the “perfect storm” for Ballmer to pack up and go back to Seattle if he can’t secure upwards of $1 billion to cover cost overruns and inflation. For perspective, when the transit connector was first discussed in 2018, its projected cost was $600 million, that number has doubled in four years.
Related: Documents Show How Inglewood Clippers Arena Deal Stayed Secret
Ballmer has been insistent he isn’t taking the Clippers anywhere. “They are the LA Clippers,” said Ballmer. But then again, his coming to Inglewood was a “secret” too.
