Seattle at Forefront of NBA Expansion Talks That Could Begin This Summer
The Seattle SuperSonics during warmups against the Boston Celtics on Dec. 28, 2007 at Key Arena. Credit: Bjørn Giesenbauer
Seattle NBA fans have gone the last 16 complete seasons without a local team to root for. Since the SuperSonics left after the 2007-08 season, hopes of a franchise returning to the Emerald City have been built on nothing more than exactly that — hope.
That was until Thursday, when NBA commissioner Adam Silver finally provided a concrete timeline regarding when the league could actually begin formal discussions about expanding from its current 30-team landscape. Better yet: Consistent with past speculation, Seattle and Las Vegas were two cities Silver namedropped as markets the NBA could be prioritizing.
“I think as we get into the summer, we’ll get into a formal process of how we go about doing it,” Silver said in an appearance on ESPN’s The Pat McAfee Show on Thursday. “I don’t want to say it’s a foregone conclusion we’re going to expand, but I also think over time organizations tend to grow.”
To be clear, Silver’s comments are not confirmation that the league is expanding. He even cautioned he “doesn’t want to jump the gun” in the interview with McAfee. It merely means they are seriously considering it — an idea that was yet to be confirmed outside of Silver stating expansion could be addressed sometime during the current NBA season. However, he then walked those comments back in March at the NBA Board of Governors meetings, stating, “We’re not ready to make any public announcements with a specific timeline.”
Silver’s latest update is another jolt to Sonics fans’ hopes of seeing an NBA team on the court at Climate Pledge Arena — the building that already houses the Seattle Storm’s home games.
“There’s no doubt there’s been interest in Las Vegas. Seattle, I’ve been very public about it that it was a market that was fantastic for the league that we left at the time for understandable reasons, but there’s no doubt there continues to be enormous passion in that market for the NBA,” Silver added. “We’re looking at those markets and others.”
Sonics legend Gary Payton has publicly maintained confidence that the NBA would return to Seattle. Payton has even stated he wants to be part of an ownership group for the team when expansion is officially a go. The league has also hosted preseason games at Climate Pledge Arena in recent seasons, in which fans have turned out in droves.
The Sonics aren’t back yet, and there’s plenty of hoops still to jump through, but Seattle is one step closer to the NBA returning.
