Cash rules everything around the NBA when it comes to expansion.
At a time when there are concerns about tanking and league depth, the Board of Governors has green-lit “formally” exploring expansions to Las Vegas and Seattle, the NBA announced Wednesday.
Each franchise could have bidding wars in the $7 billion-$10 billion range, per ESPN, and the 2028-29 season has been floated as the potential inaugural season for the respective franchises.
“Today’s vote reflects our Board’s interest in exploring potential expansion to Las Vegas and Seattle — two markets with a long history of support for NBA basketball,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in the release. “We look forward to taking this next step and engaging with interested parties.”
There have long been rumors of NBA expansion over the last two-plus decades since the league last added a franchise in 2004, and it now seems there are finally some tangible legs.
The NBA last added the Charlotte Bobcats — now the Hornets — to bump from 29 teams to 30 and create six divisions of five teams, and 32 is a natural number for an increase.
Details leaked earlier this month that the Board of Governors would vote during their meetings from March 24-25, and they need 75 percent (23 votes) to move forward.
The cash boon from the moves surely factored into the decision, since the owners would directly profit from adding two more teams.
The NBA said that PJT Partners is being enlisted as a “strategic partner to evaluate prospective markets, ownership groups, arena infrastructure and the broader economic implications of expansion.”
Seattle already has a long history with the NBA, with the SuperSonics franchise from 1967 to 2008, before the team relocated to Oklahoma City.
There has long been fervor from fans to return to the Emerald City, and now it seems the green and yellow could be on its way back.
Las Vegas has never had an NBA team, but Sin City plays host to the Summer League and the NBA Cup semifinals and championship game.
With MLB (A’s) and the NFL (Raiders) adding Las Vegas teams in recent years, to go along with the Golden Knights of the NHL, it seems a matter of time before the NBA is in Nevada.
The one concern with adding two teams is that it comes as tanking consumes the sport, and the NBA has yet to figure out how to prevent teams from being uncompetitive in the second half.
The league is attempting to implement anti-tanking procedures, but it remains to be seen whether that will be enough of a deterrent.
