NBA Beat: Seattle let Sonics get away, but could still host a team

Ladies and gentlemen, your Seattle Kings!

Nothing has happened other than a buyout agreement reached Wednesday that allows the SuperSonics to leave with what little remains of their dignity, though not the team name and colors, but that won't stop the speculation. It should take about 39 seconds before someone in Washington's King County draws a straight line to Sacramento's Kings, plus another 39 for Ron Artest to change his mind four times about whether he wants to come.

Of course it's a non-starter at the moment. The Kings have renewed hope about getting an arena at Cal Expo, even if nothing more is in place than an agreement to agree to move forward, and the NBA is far more committed to keeping a team in Sacramento than getting a new one in Seattle.

Seattle either was going to keep the SuperSonics by court order, in which case the empty building and the hostilities would carry on for years, or Seattle was going to flat-out lose the Sonics. In that regard, news that the bickering sides had reached an agreement hours before a judge's ruling probably was the best possible outcome for the city: The team will pay $45 million to get out of the final two seasons of the arena lease and possibly another $30 million in five years under certain conditions.

The "Supes," as they are known in the area, had been a poor draw for years, so the departure is more emotional in the name of tradition than anything. If half the people who supposedly were so linked to the team actually had shown up at games, this might never have happened. That always cast NBA executives in a villainous light – if the Sonics were such a beloved part of the community, consistently finishing near the bottom of the league in attendance was a strange way of proving it.

In the past 10 years, the oldest professional team in town, the only team to win a title in a major sport, has averaged 15,595 fans and broken the top 20 in attendance twice. It finished in the top half of the league once (1998-99). There have been playoff teams, different ownership groups, different coaches, a division title, and through it all little support.

So now moving vans quickly will be brought in, the transition to Oklahoma City will begin, and the ownership group can stop pretending its preference was to work things out in Washington. And then civic and government leaders in Seattle and the state capital of Olympia will begin to plot professional basketball's future there because, in a change of direction missed by many, there still is a future.

Commissioner David Stern went from a blood oath to keep the NBA out of Seattle to leaving open the possibility of an eventual replacement for the yet-to-be-named departing club, an important policy shift and olive branch during a time of hostile feelings. Owner Clay Bennett, also trying to make nice (too late), suggested months ago the city could keep the nickname and the colors, then followed through as part of the Wednesday agreement.

Nothing happens with stealing any team until Seattle can put forth a credible plan for a new arena. That's years away, and it's why the Kings, though seeming to be an immediate option, are not. The Kings don't have to relocate to have people tripping over their shoelaces trying to get a building done.

At some point, though, Seattle will be an attractive option to some franchise wanting to leverage a current home. It's too great a city with too many people and too much of a corporate base not to be an alternative for some unhappy owner.

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