Seattle

An NBA team is almost certainly coming back to Seattle. At some point. Hopefully.

Shawn Kemp has no plans on resting until there's a formal announcement.

“We’re not going to stop with the process here until we get the actual Sonics back,” the six-time All-Star told Law Murray of The Athletic. “We want the Sonics back, because the people in this community deserves that.”

The NBA held a preseason game in Seattle between the Los Angeles Clippers and Portland Trail Blazers on Monday. It was the first time the NBA held a game in Seattle since 2018.

There has been a constant clamoring for an NBA return to Seattle since the SuperSonics relocated to Oklahoma City in 2008 and became the Thunder. The Sonics are the only team with an NBA championship since the ABA-NBA merger to relocate.

Commissioner Adam Silver has been tight-lipped on the league's potential expansion plans. As rumors swirled over the summer regarding teams being added in Seattle and Las Vegas, Silver quickly halted optimism—at least for now.

“We are not discussing that at this time,” Silver told reporters in June. “As I’ve said before, at some point, this league will invariably expand, just not at this moment.”

Kemp played for the Sonics from 1989 to 1997, earning three All-NBA selections and helping lead the franchise to the 1996 NBA Finals. He and Hall of Fame guard Gary Payton have been at the forefront of the push behind the scenes to get an NBA team back in Seattle.

Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell believes the NBA will eventually return to his city.

"So without revealing my 'confidential sources,' I'm very optimistic," Harrell said, per Curtis Crabtree of Fox 13 Seattle. "But I will tell you almost on a weekly basis I'm getting updates on what's happening in the league, where there's some opportunities."

While the building of the new Climate Pledge Arena means there is a stadium in place that could house an NBA team, Crabtree explained Seattle fans may have to be patient for any type of announcement since the NBA's collective bargaining agreement expires after the 2023-24 campaign and carries a mutual opt-out for after next season.

What's more, television broadcast contracts expire after the 2024-25 season.

Taking care of those issues will probably come before adding expansion teams on the NBA's list of priorities, and Harrell even suggested as much when looking at the timeline for his optimism.

No, I'm not that optimistic by the end of the year. But I will tell you that the league, and those that make decisions including the ownership base, they fully understand that this is a great market here. And so there are other dynamics looking at the collective bargaining agreement with the players and the owners, how they make decisions, there are some other factors at play that need to be stabilized first. But Seattle is very ripe and the league understands that and they know our passion, particularly my administration's passion, for getting that team.

The idea of the NBA having expansion teams in Seattle and Las Vegas picked up steam in February when The Ringer's Bill Simmons said he had "intel" the league was exploring such a possibility.

Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic also reported earlier this month that the Oak View Group will build an arena in Las Vegas by 2026 that could serve as an NBA team's home in the future.

Yet an NBA spokesperson said "there is no truth to it" when addressing the speculation after Simmons' comments, per Chris Daniels of KING 5 in Seattle.

The NBA has a rich history in Seattle considering the SuperSonics played there from 1967-68 through 2007-08 and won the title in 1979. They also reached the NBA Finals in 1996 with Gary Payton and Shawn Kemp leading the way, although that team lost to Michael Jordan's Chicago Bulls.

Seattle lost its team when the franchise moved to Oklahoma City and became the Thunder starting with the 2008-09 season.                 

What was once KeyArena will now be Climate Pledge Arena. 

NHL Seattle announced Thursday it struck a deal with Amazon regarding the naming rights for the renovated venue.

"We've secured naming rights to the historic arena previously known as KeyArena," Amazon CEO and founder Jeff Bezos said in a press release. "Instead of naming it after Amazon, we're calling it Climate Pledge Arena as a regular reminder of the importance of fighting climate change. We look forward to working together with Oak View Group, a new Climate Pledge signatory, and NHL Seattle to inspire global climate action."

Once home to the Seattle Supersonics, Climate Pledge Arena has hosted the Seattle Storm since they entered the WNBA in 2000. The Storm have played at both Alaska Airlines Arena on the University of Washington campus and Angel of the Winds Arena in Everett, Washington, while their usual venue is under construction.

The Seattle City Council approved plans to renovate what is now Climate Pledge Arena in September 2018, effectively ending a lengthy saga as to whether the city would update the existing arena or build a new one.

The goal was to land an NHL franchise, which became a reality in December 2018. The team, which has yet to announce a nickname, is planning to enter the league ahead of the 2021-22 season.

The Seattle Times' Geoff Baker reported Climate Pledge Arena's renovations were expected to be complete by June 2021 but that delays could push the date back to August or September 2021.

Former Seattle SuperSonics owner Howard Schultz apologized to fans of the organization in his new autobiography, From the Ground UP: A Journey to Reimagine the Promise of America.

"Losing the Sonics has been tragic for generations of fans, especially kids who are growing up without the benefit of an NBA team in their city," Schultz wrote, via Jim Brunner of the Seattle Times. "It's a public wound I cannot heal. For that I will forever be deeply sorry."

The former Starbucks CEO purchased the NBA team in 2001 and sold it in 2006 to Clay Bennett, who then moved the franchise to Oklahoma City.

Schultz attempted to convince the local government to help fund renovations to Seattle's KeyArena or build a new arena and then made the sale to out-of-town businessmen when he didn't get the money.

"Almost everyone blamed me, and after some initial denial, I realized they were right to do so. I had squandered the very public trust that I had bought into," he wrote in his autobiography.

He also called his decision to sell "one of the biggest regrets of my professional life."

Though Seattle fans likely aren't going to forgive him anytime soon, at least until a new team comes to the city, Schultz is trying to win back supporters. He announced Sunday he is considering a run for president of the United States:

I love our country, and I am seriously considering running for president as a centrist independent.

— Howard Schultz (@HowardSchultz) January 28, 2019

Gaining approval in his own city would be a good place to start this endeavor.

Basketball in Seattle remains vibrant. One is just as likely to spot a throwback SuperSonics jersey in the city as much as gear for another current sports franchise. The WNBA's Storm just captured another championship. Jamal Crawford, one of the many pro players with Seattle roots, hosts an annual summer pro-am at Seattle Pacific University.

But there remains a civic-sized crater. 

"We're talking about NBA basketball," Kevin Durant said at a recent press event. "What the Storm has done is incredible. But everybody knows that Seattle sports is not complete without the Sonics."

The Sonics had been the staple of basketball culture in Seattle since 1967. They captured an NBA championship in 1979 with Fred Brown, Jack Sikma and Gus Williams, witnessed Gary Payton backing down and jawing at Michael Jordan, and hosted countless Shawn Kemp rim-benders and Ray Allen splashes. Then Durant came and won the Rookie of the Year award while offering the city a bittersweet glimpse of a future that was not to be. In the final home game of the 2007-08 season, he drove right, pump-faked and lofted a shot over Dallas' Josh Howard with less than 42 seconds left. The bucket secured Seattle's win, and more importantly, served as a curtain call to 41 years of the SuperSonics in Seattle. 

Seattle has been dealing with the fallout ever since, as well-chronicled in the 2009 documentary Sonicsgate, which delved into the organization's history and detailed diehard fans caught up in the crossfire between politics and professional sports as the Sonics relocated to Oklahoma City.

"This is a basketball-starved city," said Adam Brown, one of the documentary's creative forces. "It's always been a basketball city, and the Sonics were part of the heartbeat here. It's really clear that fans are hungry. The Storm just won the WNBA championship. It's always going to be a basketball town."

For a few hours this Friday, Seattle will be an NBA basketball town again, when Durant's Golden State Warriors play the Sacramento Kings in a preseason game.

There have been a number of false starts to get to this point, and the city will first try to entice an expansion NHL franchise. But there is hope that the NBA will also one day return to the city in a soon-to-be updated arena.   

"Hopefully, that's the start of something special there," Durant said.

---

As Durant completed his college pit stop at Texas, he began paying attention to the bottom of the NBA standings, envisioning his potential destinations.

He narrowed his realistic landing spots to either Atlanta or Boston. He thought the Celtics felt right with their rich history of championships and Hall of Famers. The probable destinations eventually became a different pair of hard-on-their-luck franchises: Portland won the lottery despite holding only a 5.3 percent chance to claim the top pick, and Seattle wound up with the second selection.

Durant had worked out for the SuperSonics in Seattle before the draft, but he had never spent significant time in the Pacific Northwest. The thought eventually won him over. He'd be experiencing a new place. His agent at the time was based in Seattle. Spencer Hawes, a close friend and former AAU teammate, is a Seattle product. Durant knew he could rely on Hawes' family to help him acclimate. 

"I was 19 years old," Durant said. "I was just trying to play. I didn't really know too much about an NBA organization or how it was run or what I needed to do. I just enjoyed the love. Everybody embraced me from the beginning. They knew I was the new kid in town and I was trying to embark on something special."

The Sonics had bright spots, despite their poor performance the year before. There were a lot of moving parts: Durant and fellow rookie Jeff Green, a hodgepodge of veterans and veteran coach P.J. Carlesimo.

Durant settled into the city's groove. He hung out at Dick's Drive-In, a Seattle staple. Though on the whole, he preferred to stay in and watch television or movies. He bought a house on Mercer Island. ("I regret actually buying that house," he said. "It was too early. I learned from it.") He loved driving from the island along the Lacey V. Murrow Memorial Bridge, where he could see the water and the budding mountains off in the horizon when it wasn't raining.

In retrospect, he didn't see the signs that a move would happen. Not that fast. No player paid much attention to off-court happenings, because the majority of the roster always seemed to be in flux. No one beyond Nick Collison had spent much time playing for the franchise or living in the city.

"When [new owner] Clay Bennett came in at the end of the season, we talked about where we might move to," Durant said. "That came up. But he didn't tell us the timetable or anything, just know it's going to be a lot of noise around us moving and the franchise relocating. But we didn't really know too much. Nick was the only one who kept his eye on things the whole year."

When the move happened, Durant was surprised. He found out while he was back at the University of Texas attending summer classes after the season. During a drive, a Texas assistant coach called and informed him the Seattle SuperSonics were no more.

First, Durant was filled with excitement. Texas and Oklahoma are close geographically. He was no stranger to bouncing around—he had done so frequently as a youth—and quick transitions felt natural. He thought the franchise would remain in Seattle for at least four years, but he would be fine. Unfortunately, he did not have a chance to experience Seattle as much as he wanted. But this was the job. He would go on to star in OKC and later, Golden State.

---

After Durant and Seattle parted ways, hoops in the city laid dormant for a while. Efforts to revive the NBA have failed, although not for lack of trying. In 2013, an investment group led by Seattle native and hedge fund manager Chris Hansen and former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer attempted to lure the Kings away from Sacramento. But after the NBA's board of governors rejected the bid, the Kings' owners, the Maloof family, sold the team to a group led by Vivek Ranadive, and the organization remained in Sacramento.

Other efforts have fizzled out. When Ballmer purchased the Clippers in 2014, Hansen pressed on in his efforts to bring basketball back to Seattle without him. The NBA has no current plans of expanding. It will almost certainly take a new arena, or KeyArena with a makeover. A $700 million overhaul of KeyArena is underway, which calls for the arena's size to nearly double and a 360-foot-long glass atrium. But it's unclear if that would be enough to satisfy the league. The project is being headed by Oak View Group and Tim Leiweke, the former president and CEO of Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment and Anschutz Entertainment Group.

Hansen still hopes to build an arena of his own south of downtown. He continues to purchase land in the area. But a memorandum of understanding between Hansen, the city and King County expired last year. The city hopes to host an NHL team in time for the 2020-21 season, but a renovated KeyArena could be a legitimate option for the NBA in the future.

"Seattle politics is kind of complicated," Brown adds. "Everyone was fired up about the SoDo arena deal. And now everyone's fired up about KeyArena, but some fans still wanted SoDo. Really, ultimately Seattle fans just want whoever can actually bring a team."

Durant agreed. "Just think about the people that come to those games that need that outlet for an hour or two," he said. "They just need to release for a little bit and enjoy the game. One night you might have Kobe [Bryant] come to town or LeBron [James] come to town. Carmelo [Anthony]. Just to know those guys are in your city playing basketball. Just a cool feeling. I felt that way as a kid, and my friends as well. ... It just felt good knowing you had that in your city. I kind of sympathize with the fans and just know that it's tough not having basketball there, especially as a deeply rooted basketball city."

Many of the Sonics' familiar players still live in the city, like Detlef Schrempf and Lenny Wilkens. Kemp once ran a popular restaurant here.

But if there's one player who plays the role of Seattle's foremost ambassador, it is Jamal Crawford. The 18-year NBA veteran attended Seattle's Rainier Beach High School, which also produced Doug Christie, Nate Robinson and Terrence Williams. He took over running the Seattle Pro-Am summer basketball league from Christie nearly 15 years ago. Crawford takes the job as seriously as he does an isolation play with little time on the clock. He corrals players who are in Seattle, enticing them to at least come out and watch, as he did with Bryant a few years ago.

This really happened today! Thank you Jeannine & @RealBillRussell for coming through @thecrawsover. Beyond honored. Nothing but love and respect !! pic.twitter.com/c0iBwBFTSi

— 🏁 Jamal Crawford (@JCrossover) August 20, 2018

"All-Stars, All-NBA legends come support the pro-am, and even then, when they come, they think they're just playing in the pro-am, but then they see the connection to us not having the Sonics and the connection to the kids and how important it is to them, they're like, 'Wow,'" Crawford said. "It means even more to them when they actually come play."

---

This past September, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame enshrinement ceremony served as a reminder of the SuperSonics' impact on basketball culture. 

Allen was an annual All-Star during his Seattle stint. Rick Welts, who orchestrated All-Star Weekend, began his winding and influential NBA executive career as a ball boy with the organization. 

Wally Walker, a player on Seattle's lone championship team and the executive who traded for Allen, decided to attend the ceremony to support the pair.  

When Walker greeted Welts and Raymond Ridder, Golden State's vice president of communications, Ridder noted: "OK, he's excited about getting into the Hall of Fame, but he's about as excited about the preseason game in Seattle as he is about this whole thing tonight."

Walker said a day does not go by without someone bringing up the Sonics with him. According to a recent report he read, the SuperSonics routinely hosted western Washington's most diverse crowd of any gathering. 

"That's hard to replace," he said. "It's not hard. It's impossible to replace what that brought to the community, where you have a diverse group of all kinds coming together and pulling for their hometown guys. There's just a void that the city is growing, but you can't replace that void. Not just because the sport is fantastic, but because of what it brings to the community."

The Seattle preseason game is largely the brainchild of Welts, who's now Golden State's president and chief operating officer. He started thinking of the possibility shortly after the team lured Durant in free agency two summers ago. 

"Probably about a year ago now, we all agreed it would be a good time and good place, and I think that it'll be a really great opportunity for the city of Seattle to show their love of the NBA," Welts said. "I'm pretty excited about it."

Teams schedule their own preseason games, unlike the regular-season schedule that the league sets. The Warriors hoped to stay in the West this preseason after traveling to China last year. The staff looked for cities with a built-in fanbase and quickly agreed Seattle would be a logical locale, given Welts and Durant's roots.

The NBA consented to the Seattle game, and the Warriors offered to pay the Kings to travel and play in it. There was concern that KeyArena's renovation would prevent the game—officials briefly looked at the University of Washington as an alternate site—but they were able to schedule it for the Friday before the overhaul begins.  

This won't be the first time Welts has brought the NBA to Seattle. A few years after he joined the league's office in 1982, Welts helped bring the NBA All-Star Game to the Seattle in 1987. 

"I think it'll be the same kind of feeling," Welts said. "It was really rewarding then to see the city rally around the NBA and the All-Star Game. I think this, while different, will definitely re-emphasize to the basketball world what a shame it is that we don't have a team in Seattle and hopefully focus some attention on how that might come about in the future." 

Welts said Durant eagerly agreed when he brought the idea to him.

"It'll mean more to him being able to see it full circle," Durant said. "I'm sure he thought of the idea to bring us out there to play. Rick has always been great about bringing something great together and having a good idea and putting it to life. For him to spend so much time there and for me to have a connection there was perfect that they put the game."

The preseason game sold nearly 12,000 tickets in its first hour on sale.

Durant estimates that he has returned to the city just a handful of times since the relocation—to play in Crawford's summer league, to help refurbish a basketball court and to attend a Mariners and Seahawks game.

He can play the what-if game for plenty of moments in his career. The question of what if the Sonics stayed in Seattle and Durant blossomed there remains at the top of the list.

"But I just felt like I knew for sure the energy would've been crazy, and making our first playoff like we did in OKC, guys getting MVP, that would've been amazing," Durant said. "Fans would've been supportive. The energy would've been crazy around the city. When the Seahawks won the championship, we were a pretty good team. We were trying to win a championship as well. All of that energy, I try to think about that sometimes. It would've been really, really cool in Seattle sports for all of those teams to be doing well."

His perspective on the relocation of the franchise has evolved. He was still getting used to the city when the change happened.

"You started to realize what that meant to the fans and people in Seattle," he said. "You're seeing the teams and the Chargers move and you see the Raiders are thinking about moving. Even us moving across the Bridge, you know how much a franchise means to the community. Now that I got older, I understand what those fans have been going through a long time."

He believes his old Sonics gear is in a storage bin. Maybe, he said, it would be cool to dust them off soon and see what's actually in there. 

        

An earlier version of this story noted that NBA commissioner Adam Silver declined to comment through a spokesperson. That was incorrect. B/R regrets the error.

Jonathan Abrams is a senior writer for B/R Mag. A former staff writer at Grantland and sports reporter at the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, Abrams is also the best-selling author of All the Pieces Matter: The Inside Story of The Wire—available right here, right now. Follow him on Twitter: @jpdabrams 

The Oak View Group, which is attempting to bring an NHL franchise to Seattle, is also open to bringing an NBA franchise back to the city, according to Emily Kaplan of ESPN.com.

"If there is a franchise to be had from the NBA, we want to be up there fighting for it for Seattle," investment banker David Bonderman told Kaplan.

The Oak View Group is made up of Bonderman, Hollywood producer Jerry Bruckheimer and the former president and CEO of the Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment group, Tim Leiweke.

The group is planning on breaking ground on a remodeled Key Arena in October and already "submitted paperwork and a $10 million down payment to the league," with the NHL "likely to accept the bid, pending the results of the season-ticket drive" that will begin in Seattle on Thursday, per Kaplan.

The group hopes to have an NHL franchise playing by the 2020-21 season. The hope is that the new arena will be able to sustain more than one franchise, as Leiweke told Kaplan: 

"The way we are going to structure all of our contractually obligated income is making sure there will be revenue upside built in should the NBA ever consider Seattle. We are committed to making sure the building, all of our contracts, all of our partnerships and all of our relationships, are done in a way that we can maximize value.

"There is no need to ultimately build two [arenas] when you can make one work as long as you have the foresight and the vision to make sure you're thinking through that at the beginning of the process, and that's what we're trying to do."

Seattle last had an NBA franchise in 2008 before the Seattle SuperSonics were relocated to Oklahoma City by team owner Clay Bennett and rebranded as the Thunder. Since then, efforts to bring a team back to the city have fallen short, though Seattle remains at the forefront of potential expansion cities for the NBA.

"I don't want to put a precise timeline on it," NBA Commissioner Adam Silver told Portland Trail Blazers star CJ McCollum during an interview for the Players' Tribune last July when asked about league expansion (h/t Chris Mannix of Yahoo Sports). "But it's inevitable at some point we'll start looking at growth of franchises. That's always been the case in this league, and Seattle will no doubt be on a short list of cities we’ll look at."

The city of Seattle is reportedly one step closer to having an NHL team. 

On Tuesday, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet reported Seattle's ownership group formally filed a $10 million down payment and an application for an NHL expansion team.

Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic noted there are still a number of steps before any pucks drop in the Emerald City, including the official review of the application, "due diligence" from the league, review from an executive committee and a recommendation to the board.

Despite the remaining steps, Seattle mayor Jenny Durkan weighed in on the news:

Excited to share the news that @OvgSeattle completed their application to the @NHL - one step closer to bringing another great sports team to our City and revitalizing @SeattleCenter #NHLtoSeattle pic.twitter.com/MOFVO1229I

— Jenny Durkan (@MayorJenny) February 13, 2018

There is no team in the state of Washington or any bordering states, and, while the Vancouver Canucks are somewhat nearby, a team in Seattle would give the NHL a stateside presence in the Pacific Northwest.

A TSN report provided additional details, noting the team would potentially take the ice in the 2020-21 season at KeyArena, where the SuperSonics played in the NBA. It also pointed out the NHL's Board of Governors deemed the price for an expansion fee would be $650 million for Seattle, which is significantly more than the $500 million fee for the Vegas Golden Knights.

According to TSN, the league invited the Seattle ownership group to apply for expansion in December. The prospective ownership group includes Hollywood producer Jerry Bruckheimer.

An expansion team in Seattle would represent the 32nd team in the NHL.

Washington State quarterback Luke Falk withdrew from the Senior Bowl on Friday in order to attend the funeral of former Cougars teammate Tyler Hilinski, according to his agency, Rep 1 Sports (via Stefanie Loh of the Seattle Times).

Hilinski, who served as Falk's backup at Washington State, was found dead by suicide Jan. 16.

In honor of Hilinski, Falk wore No. 3 at the Senior Bowl practices.

Falk explained his reasoning behind the number switch to reporters earlier this week: "I just felt like [the jersey switch] is what I needed to do. He needs to be remembered. He was an amazing person and an amazing soul. This guy was one of the most outgoing, bubbly ... just a guy you want to be around. And people need to know it."

According to Loh, Hilinski's funeral will be held Saturday at Damien High School in La Verne, California.

Falk threw for at least 30 touchdowns each of the past three seasons at Washington State and finished his career with 14,481 passing yards, 119 touchdowns and 39 interceptions.

The NHL has approved Seattle's request to submit an expansion application and will permit the city to begin a season-ticket drive, according to Emily Kaplan of ESPN. 

Kaplan also reported NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman set a $650 million price for the expansion, compared to the $500 million price that was set for the Vegas Golden Knights. Seattle's potential franchise would enter the NHL in the 2020-21 season.

"It is envisioned that the terms of an expansion agreement, would it go forward, would basically be the same as Las Vegas—except the price," Bettman said at the league's Board of Governors meeting, per Kaplan. "If we decide for whatever reason for the 2020 season, instead of expanding, using an existing franchise, that's always an option. But that's not something we're focused on right now. Because we're not anticipating anybody moving right now."

This latest step isn't a guarantee there will soon be an NHL franchise in Seattle.

"That doesn't mean we have granted an expansion team," Bettman emphasized, per Dan Rosen of NHL.com. "We have agreed as a league to take and consider an expansion application and to let them run in the next few months a season-ticket drive." 

The Oak View Group, which is the prospective ownership group for Seattle's potential NHL franchise, will run that drive in an effort to determine the level of interest in the city.

Per Kaplan, "the Seattle city council approved a Memorandum of Understanding for the privately financed Oak View Group to move forward with a $660 million remodeling of Key Arena, paving the way for potential NBA and NHL franchises."

Bettman also noted Seattle is the only city being considered for expansion, according to the Associated Press (h/t USA Today), with Kaplan reporting that the NHL has long "coveted" having Seattle in the NHL.

Bettman also provided an update on several other cities, per Pierre LeBrun of TSN: 

Bettman says he doesn't know where this leaves Quebec City other than to say right now they're only looking at Seattle for possible expansion. Points to geography and chance to balance the conferences

— Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) December 7, 2017

Bettman says nothing going on right now with Houston

— Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) December 7, 2017

Bettman says Arizona still working on arena plan and says he doesn't consider them a re-location candidate

— Pierre LeBrun (@PierreVLeBrun) December 7, 2017

Seattle has never been host to an NHL team, though as Rosen noted, the Seattle Metropolitans competed in the Pacific Coast Hockey Association between 1915 and 1924 and won the Stanley Cup in 1917.

The Seattle City Council voted 7-1 in favor of approving a memorandum of understanding for a $600 million renovation of KeyArena, the Seattle Times' Geoff Baker reported Monday. 

The Seattle Times noted the vote clears the way for the NHL to put a team in the city. Baker reported Sunday that "there are hints the NHL could make a Seattle franchise announcement in the months ahead."

The Seattle Times shared the proposals from the Oak View Group for how KeyArena will look when it's fully renovated in 2020:

BREAKING: Seattle City Council approves $600 million renovation of KeyArena. The project could be completed as early as October 2020 (via @GeoffBakerTIMES) https://t.co/rtOH7HntCR pic.twitter.com/fsuS1m436s

— The Seattle Times (@seattletimes) December 5, 2017

Turner Sports analyst David Aldridge provided more context about the council's decision:

The vote puts the Seattle city government squarely behind OVG, headed by longtime sports executive/AEG CEO Tim Leiweke & entertainment manager/mogul Irving Azoff, instead of billionaire Chris Hansen, who has sought to build an arena in the South Downtown section of the city.

— David Aldridge (@davidaldridgedc) December 5, 2017

Chris Hansen, who failed in his attempt to purchase the Sacramento Kings and relocate them to Seattle, led a group which proposed building a new arena in Seattle's SoDo neighborhood and offered to pay for renovations to KeyArena as well.

The council voted in May 2016 against giving Hansen the land necessary to build the new arena, and Monday's vote is another blow for Hansen's group.

Either building a new arena or making significant upgrades to KeyArena was widely seen as the main roadblock preventing Seattle from getting an NHL franchise or re-entering the NBA. KeyArena was completed in 1962 and underwent a facelift in 1995.

The Seattle SuperSonics called KeyArena home until they relocated to Oklahoma City in 2008. Former NBA commissioner David Stern told reporters at the time the venue "was not an adequate arena going forward."

The Seattle Storm have played in KeyArena since joining the WNBA in 2000. The Seattle City Council approved a 10-year lease in May that will ensure the Storm remain in KeyArena through 2028.