NBA votes to begin expansion process, bring Sonics back to Seattle. What’s next?

It’s happening.

After 18 years of waiting, 18 years of bitter anger among basketball fans across the Pacific Northwest, “BRING BACK OUR SONICS!” is on.

The process to bring the Sonics back to Seattle is beginning.

The NBA announced Wednesday at its Board of Governors meeting in New York it is starting the process of expansion, and exclusively in Seattle and in Las Vegas.

The new franchises are expected to begin play as the league’s 31st and 32nd teams in the fall of 2028.

“The NBA Board of Governors today voted to authorize the league to fomally explore potential team expansion to Las Vegas and Seattle,” the league said in a statement issued by the NBA communications department Wednesday morning.

The vote was unanimous across owners of all 30 teams.

“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,” commissioner Adam Silver said. “We look forward to taking this next step and engaging with interested parties.” The process of the NBA expanding for the first time since 2004 (when Charlotte got back a franchise it had lost in a move to New Orleans) is expected to fetch of bids of $7-10 billion for each new team.

The return of the Sonics could become one of two $10 billion franchise sales this year in Seattle.

The Seahawks of the NFL are for sale. Estimates are the buyer(s) may pay $10 billion or more for the Super Bowl champions.

The richest sale of a franchise in North American sports history was last year’s purchase of the NBA’s Los Angeles Lakers, for $10 billion.

So now the Pacific Northwest must have two ownership groups step forward to spend up to $20 billion or more to buy the Seahawks plus bring the Sonics back to Seattle.

A fan of the old Seattle SuperSonics holds a sign before the Rain City Showcase NBA preseason game between the Los Angeles Clippers and the Utah Jazz at Climate Pledge Arena in Seattle on October 10, 2023. (Photo by Steph Chambers/Getty Images)

(Steph Chambers/Getty Images)What’s next

It’s believed the NBA Board of Governors by voting to proceed with expansion have set a threshold the bids each new franchise must meet. If the resulting bids meet the league’s minimums, a final vote could happen later this year.

The vetting process for new owners typically takes months. Lawyers and analysts review in detail the financial backings and holdings of those seeking to buy the new franchises.

The expansion fees are for the league’s team owners to keep. It is not part of Basketball Related Income defined by the NBA’s collective bargaining agreement that teams must share with their players.

The league expects to update its owners on the vetting of potential owners for the new franchises in July, during meetings at the NBA Summer League competition in July.

One potential owner of the new Sonics emerged this week.

Samantha Holloway, owner of the NHL’s Seattle Kraken and daughter of Kraken’s original owner the late David Bonderman, and Kraken CEO Tod Leiweke announced Monday they were forming One Roof Sports and Entertainment. That will be an umbrella company to run multiple sports properties in Seattle, including the Kraken and its home venue, Climate Pledge Arena.

Leiweke, a former CEO of the Seahawks plus the NBA’s Houston Rockets, and his brother Tim of the Oak View Group built and opened Climate Pledge Arena in a $1.2 billion private-public partnership in Seattle Center in 2021. They built the arena to NBA specifications.

Climate Pledge Arena is on the same site and replaced KeyArena, which then-NBA commissioner David Stern determined was antiquated and unfit for a franchise in the mid-2000s. That led to the Sonics’ new Oklahoman owners (that Howard Schultz had sold them to) to move the team to Oklahoma City in 2008.

That ended the team’s 41 years in Seattle, which included the SuperSonics winning the 1979 NBA championship.

Given the steep price tag, there could be a group of owners who invest in bidding on the new Sonics. The NBA stipulates a controlling owner must have at least 15% equity, and a franchise can have up to 25 individual owners that own at least a 1% stake.

Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson posted on social media Tuesday he had a “productive meeting” with the NBA’s Silver this week.

Wednesday after the league’s vote to begin the expansion process to Seattle and Las Vegas, Governor Ferguson posted online: “For two decades, Washingtonians have mourned the loss of our Sonics. Today’s vote is a milestone in the effort to bring NBA basketball back home. “The time is right. The state-of-the-art Climate Pledge Arena already hosts professional basketball and hockey with the Storm, Kraken, and Torrent in front of a dedicated fanbase. And we know we have the best fans in the NBA. “Bringing the Sonics back is a top priority, and the state will be a strong partner in this effort. I plan to be there at tipoff with thousands of fellow fans when the Sonics return.”

Sonics legendary player and coach Lenny Wilkens honored Saturday, June 28, 2025, outside Climate Pledge Arena with a statue of him in his playing days of 1968-72 with the Seattle SuperSonics.

Why Seattle. Why now

The return of the SuperSonics has remained a tease to the city, and to the Pacific Northwest since the Sonics left in 2008. That was after Schultz sold Seattle’s proud, historic franchise to a group from Oklahoma City, and after a trial over its KeyArena lease ended with a settlement between Seattle city leaders and the Sonics’ new owners. That settlement allowed new Sonics owner Clay Bennett and his group to move the franchise to Oklahoma City.

Since then, Seattle has gained what led to the Sonics leaving in the first place: a glittering, new arena built to NBA specifications including with rich, luxury suites in downtown Seattle. Climate Pledge Arena, the 18,000-seat palace for the NHL’s Kraken and WNBA’s Storm in Seattle Center.

NBA owners know Seattle’s high-tech and corporate wealth make it perhaps the most attractive market in North America that doesn’t have a team.

Silver has mentioned expansion for two years, while first settling the NBA’s new media-rights contracts in early 2024.

Then it was that expansion had to wait for the sales of its two most storied, highest-valued franchises, the Boston Celtics and the Lakers, both in 2025.

The league obviously sees this as more than righting a wrong done in Seattle 18 years ago by Sonics buyer/owner Bennett and his Oklahoma City friends.

NBA owners see a ton of money, tens of billions of dollars, they can make for themselves by returning the Sonics to Seattle.

Kobe Bryant #24 of the Los Angeles Lakers shoots against Johan Petro #27 of the Seattle SuperSonics during an NBA game at Key Arena, February 24, 2008 in Seattle, Washington. (Photo by Otto Greule Jr/Getty Images)

NBA votes to begin expansion process, bring Sonics back to Seattle. What’s next?

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