Advertisement - scroll for more content
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement - scroll for more content
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
The game also carries a strong Portland link for Lions head coach Tautvydas Sabonis. His father, Arvydas Sabonis, spent seven seasons with the Trail Blazers between 1995 and 2003 and remains one of the most beloved European players ever to wear a Blazers shirt.
Iman Shumpert: ‘I’m so excited for him to start this journey in Portland. I want him to prove everybody wrong so bad. It make me so angry and it's in retrospect, but it's like, out of anybody that's need to have one, y'all don't think he would like, just the audacity of the state when people are like, what is he ever going for? I'm like, bro, they making $200 million a year. Like, in three years, they going to have $200 million. Like, you don't think he going to have a firearm to defend himself? I'm like, a security guard will rob him. It's all security. Like, what? Like, it's a lot of money, so it's perspective wise, I just, yeah, he did a dumb thing by going on the internet with it. But it's like, I just want him to be able to write the wrong, not even off the court, but on the court, to be healthy and doing the thing that it's like, this is what got him in this situation.’
While the Blazers kept throwing their “threat of litigation” screwball throughout Thursday’s session, they also mixed in some curveballs — most notably, how much they are taxed and how difficult it is to do business in Portland. Hankins said the Blazers are “paying taxes higher than any other team” and that the city’s term sheet contained more than 20 material departures from the bill signed by the Oregon state legislature in March — all of them costing the Blazers more money to operate. These asks by the city, Hankins said, come after the Blazers have paid an estimated $1 billion over the last 30 years to build, maintain and upgrade the arena. “Portland’s current stagnant business climate, high income taxes, and divisive political environment makes this a tough city to invest in,’’ Hankins told the council. “It makes it harder to sell tickets, secure corporate sponsorships and recruit players.’’
Throughout the meeting, the Trail Blazers contingent projected mixed signals to the council. Conyers and Hankins said negotiations between the team and the city never stopped, but they “appreciate the invitation” to meet with Mayor Keith Wilson, who is the primary contact for talks with the city. Hankins gave an opening statement saying Dundon’s ownership group wants to keep the team in Portland and reach a resolution with the city. “They do believe Portland has the best fans in the world,” Hankins said. “They believe we can build a team that Rip City can be proud of. And they believe that Portland is the best and most obvious choice for this team.”
Advertisement
The existing lease between the city and the Blazers establishes that Rip City Management is responsible for “maintaining the arena in a first-class manner,” as well as funding repairs, maintenance and improvement projects. That means if the Blazers decide to leave Portland, the city could sue for the money required to upgrade the Moda Center. But the Blazers say the first-class provision — and the threat of litigation — is a sticking point in its negotiations with the city, which owns the arena. “We need the city to take the prospect of litigation off the table by affirming the work the team has done to maintain Moda Center in a first-class condition,” Blazers spokesperson Charles Boyle told The Oregonian/OregonLive on Wednesday. “Removing that threat is a critical first step to unlock a freer flow of information about the building and the renovation.”
An olive branch offered by the City of Portland to the Trail Blazers has been rejected by the team as the two sides remain far apart in arena lease negotiations. On Friday, Portland City Council president Jamie Dunphy sent a letter to Blazers president Dewayne Hankins, inviting him to attend a work session Thursday with the 12-member council to address the team’s concerns about the term sheet delivered by the city.
Mike Vorkunov on Trail Blazers: My question has always been where would they go, right? If they were to leave, and I think the the probably the place that off the top of my head jumps out is Raleigh, North Carolina, right, which is where the Carolina Hurricanes, the hockey team that Tom Dundon owns and currently reside. And Portland is the 23rd largest media market in the country. Raleigh, the list I saw this morning is number 22. Portland probably has a larger population in its metro area but nonetheless, he has an arena there. I think they just refurbished it, so that's ready to move in.
It’s the oldest manipulation trick in the playbook. Create friction. Foster distance. Break down communication. Poison the relationship and gaslight. Make Portland fans so frustrated and angry with you that they throw their hands up, stop showing up, and play the role of bad guy, ending the relationship themselves. Do you miss Paul Allen? Mark Warkentien, a former assistant general manager with the Blazers, told me numerous times that fans would miss Allen after he was gone. Warkentien gave me the “Portland fans don’t know how good they have it,” speech more than once. Paul spent on his NBA roster. He sprung for T-shirts. His NBA staff threw lavish sponsor parties and always reached for the tab at events. I heard stories about Allen pulling out the electric guitar in front of staffers on his yacht — Tatoosh — and playing as if he were Jimi Hendrix.
Yaron Weitzman: Could Portland actually be on the verge of losing the Blazers? I spoke to multiple NBA ownership-level sources this week. Every one had the same take: Dundon is bluffing and simply trying to squeeze as much as he can out of the city of Portland. Or, as one said, "There's nowhere for him to go." For one, you can take Seattle and Vegas off the board. NBA owners want the expansion fees, expected to land in the $6-7 billion range. As one source put it to me, "Even if I liked Tom a lot, I like $200 million a lot more." As for other markets: even if you believe a place like Kansas City or Nashville is ready for an NBA team, the math doesn't check out for someone who approaches ownership the way Dundon does. He'd have to pay a relocation fee, then spend to renovate or build an arena in the new city, all in a market without the built-in fan base he already has in Portland. It'd be bad business. So why is Dundon being so aggressive and antagonistic toward Portland now? Especially when, as one source put it, "None of this was a secret. He bought Portland and knew it needed a new arena. It's not like he found an accounting error in the books." "My guess is because he knows that the second the NBA moves on Seattle and Vegas, he loses all his leverage," a different ownership source said. "He knows he's got a very tight window now to play this game and I guess he's going for it." That said, one line, from a third source who's dealt with plenty of owners and team sales, stuck with me. "If the plan was to come in and bully a bunch of politicians in Portland, well he clearly didn't do any research." So the good news for Blazers fans: Most people around the NBA think the team's remaining in Portland. The bad news is that it looks like Tom Dundon is going to be part of your lives for a long time.
Advertisement
Mike Vorkunov: As everyone continues to monitor Portland to see if the Trail Blazers can reach a deal with the local gov't on funding for arena renovations, it is worth considering what the NBA's constitution says about relocation and how it would have to happen: — The team owner must pay a $250,000 application fee for relocation. — The team must apply to relocate by March 1 of the season before when it intends to move. — The NBA commissioner appoints a relocation committee of at least 5 owners. They investigate the relocation and have to deliver their findings within 120 days of the application, and recommend whether to approve or deny relocation. — The relocation committee's recommendation will depend on 9 factors: the team's support in their market, the ability of the current city to support the team (including arena situation), the ability of the new city to support a NBA team, and impact on the NBA as a whole (including effect of the move on its media deal and sponsors), among other factors. — "The question whether to approve the proposed relocation shall be decided by a MAJORITY vote" of NBA team owners, not 3/4 as is often the case on NBA matters. — NBA's Board of Governors can impose the team owner to indemnify the league and pay a fee to be able to move the team.
Joe Freeman: Kevin Calabro tells me has decided to step away from Blazers broadcasting and will no longer call games for Portland. The team and its veteran play-by-play man had been in discussions on a new contract, but he called the offers "subprime" and he has decided to move on.
A Portland teenager found a random old Lakers jacket in a Goodwill bin in January. He paid $3.07 for it. Seven months later, the item sold at auction for $89,600. Turns out the old jacket wasn’t so random after all. Verified by Sotheby’s auction house, it was a warmup jacket worn by NBA legend Wilt Chamberlain at least three times. That includes during the 1972 NBA Finals in which the Lakers defeated the New York Knicks in five games and Chamberlain was named the series MVP. “This is Truly a once in a lifetime find,” Quinn Brown wrote on Instagram in January. “I am so grateful this jacket has landed in my hands.”
A Wilt Chamberlain warmup jacket originally found in a Portland, Oregon, Goodwill sold for $89,600 (including buyer's premium) at Sotheby's on Monday. In January, Quinn Brown, 19, raided a bargain bin, looking for a jacket he'd seen someone toss in that seemed like it bore Los Angeles Lakers colors. Brown had been buying vintage clothes to resell online for three years; his priciest resell had netted him $250. The warmup jacket says "Chamberlain" on the back and cost Brown $3.07.