We here in the Pacific Northwest, with the possible exception of Portland, go through life with an entirely too congenial attitude.
It’s like we were all raised by June Cleaver.
We slow down to allow other drivers onto the freeway.
We smile at strangers as we pass them on the sidewalk.
Clothing stores are all too happy to let us make exchanges. We could keep a shirt for a month, dump rat repellant on it, dye it black and Nordie’s will take it back. Exchange anything in New York, they call security.
All of this, of course, must change if we want another NBA team in Seattle.
We have to become Oklahoma City.
We’ve got to play dirty — we need a Clay Bennett, a prospective owner unrestricted by neither feat nor scruples. Is Steve Ballmer the guy? Time will tell.
We have to get nasty because that’s how the game is played. Bennett taught us that. We have to be the wolf in sheep’s clothing and go after the weak, vulnerable fawn, be it Sacramento, Milwaukee, New Orleans, Charlotte or Memphis.
And get expansion out of your head. Your grandchildren may have grandchildren by the time the league gets around to adding a team. Instead, yank a financially ailing squad from an unsuspecting city. It’s quicker. And it’s more fun. Yes, it was anything but pleasant when it was done to us, but again, that’s the game today.
Learn to love it. Oklahoma City did.
Bennett’s example can teach us how.
Bennett saw a weakness. The Sonics and the city of Seattle couldn’t agree on a lease. The team was bathing in red ink.
So he pounced.
That’s what we have to do, as unsavory as it sounds.
If it can happen in Seattle, one of the top 15 media markets in the country, one that boasted 41 years of NBA tradition with names such as Brown, Sikma, McDaniel, Kemp and Allen, it can happen anywhere.
We just have to force the issue a tad.
We have to remind area politicians that they are accountable, remind them that there’s always another election. The geniuses in this state settled for a maximum $75 million price tag for a franchise worth at least seven times that. Unacceptable.
Bennett taught us aggression in pursuing a team, both financially and ethically. He overpaid for the franchise, lied when he outlined his intent to keep the team in Seattle, proposed a building so outrageously expensive to taxpayers that a metropolis of oil sheiks would reject it, perjured himself on the stand and got away with it.
In other words, he got it done.
Losing the Sonics should have taught us something. One is that nice guys constitute weakness. The feeble and unprepared lose franchises. No one had the courage to address the lease issue with any sense of urgency. No one was willing to sit down and seriously negotiate a deal.
The idea was beyond their capabilities.
Therefore, a new cast is needed.
A new cast is needed to do what it takes to hunt down and secure another NBA franchise. If we’re afraid to step on toes, if we’re hesitant to crack a few heads, if we’re afraid to hurt a few feelings, we’re done before we start.
If an NBA franchise is worth getting, it’s worth playing cutthroat to get it.
Sports columnist John Sleeper: sleeper@heraldnet.com. For Sleeper[`]s blog, “Dangling Participles,” go to www.heraldnet.com/danglingparticiples.
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