SEATTLE – Seattle SuperSonics president Wally Walker, general manager Rick Sund and head coach Nate McMillan gathered Monday with members of the Puget Sound-area media to discuss the team’s recent season and its future prospects.
The trio fielded questions for almost an hour, but still the session ended with plenty of topics left unanswered.
No one knows, for instance, whether McMillan truly wants to return. Coming off a season that was far better than anyone inside or outside the organization could have predicted, he will have an enviable bargaining position when talks commence about a new contract sometime in the next week or two. Other league teams will surely ask about his availability, and in fact it is believed some already have.
Neither does anyone know if Sund, who in recent years laid the groundwork for Seattle’s surprising Northwest Division title and playoff run with a series of rabbit-out-of-hat deals, will be back. Like McMillan, he is sure to draw interest from rival ballclubs.
Also, five-time All-Star Ray Allen will be one of the league’s free-agent plums this offseason. Allen, a second-team All-NBA pick in 2004-05, says he wants to return next season, but negotiations for a new contract sputtered in recent months and the two parties are believed to be a good $10 million apart on what will likely be a five-year deal.
Lastly, the Sonics franchise is continuing to lose money, and with eight free agents in addition to Allen the front office has some great challenges as it tries, in Walker’s words, “to do our best to keep the momentum that we have.”
“We want to be competitive, we want to win, and we want to keep good people together,” he added. “We have a good group, starting with these two guys right here (McMillan and Sund). They’ve set a good tone for how we want to be as a team and an organization, so we’ll start there (with contract talks). Then we’ll talk to Ray and go from there.”
Encouraging words, but the reality is that the Sonics could look very different – and have a very different outlook – when they reconvene for training camp in October.
On Monday, McMillan had several chances to express a commitment to Seattle and the Sonics. Instead, he plans to take a week to unwind before giving any thought to “whether I want to continue.”
It is, he went on, “something I’ve done each year, even when the year I was coming back was guaranteed. But do I want to continue to do this? Is it too much? Am I fit for this?”
McMillan is believed to have earned some $3.5 million in base salary this season, which puts him in the higher echelon of NBA coaches, salary-wise. He will certainly expect a raise on a new contract.
Sund, meanwhile, is thought to be among the lower paid general managers, though he would not disclose his salary. The league average for GMs is roughly $1.5 million, which would seem a probable starting point for contract talks with him.
The big numbers kick in for Allen, who is trying to make the most of what will be his last really big contract. The figures are sketchy, but the Sonics are believed to have initially suggested a five-year deal worth around $70 million, then boosted their offer to around $75 million.
Allen and Lon Babby, his agent, are thought to have requested something in excess of $90 million at the outset, but have since dropped their price tag some.
Compared to other league teams, the Sonics have the inside track to getting Allen (an unrestricted free agent) signed, given constraints in the league’s collective bargaining agreement. That deal, though, expires after this season, adding an element of uncertainty to these negotiations.
“We want to get him signed,” Walker said. “Given what he did in the postseason, that’s just stating the obvious. (No talks are) scheduled, but it will happen, or at least the dialogue will.”
Also up for a new deal this summer is forward Vlade Radmanovic, the team’s third-leading scorer in the regular season. He is a restricted free agent, meaning Seattle can keep Radmanovic by matching any offer he gets with another team, but his salary is still likely to vault from $2.3 million in 2004-05 to a new five- or six-year contract in the neighborhood of $32-40 million.
The Sonics had a payroll this season of around $53 million, but Walker was vague about whether that figure will increase, and if so by how much. Budget decisions must wait, he said, “until we see what the new collective bargaining agreement looks like.”
“But what we have decided,” Walker said, “is that the best solution for our financial challenges is to compete for titles and win games. We’re going to get ourselves in a better position by upping the revenue lines as opposed to cutting a bunch of costs. We’ve been pretty lean there and we need to keep investing in our scouting, our personnel and the people who have been delivering for us.”
More than half of the NBA’s 30 teams lose money, he said, and those that turn a profit are usually in large markets or are the only game in town, such as Sacramento or San Antonio. The Sonics are not only in a market flush with pro and college teams, but also have a lease agreement with the city of Seattle for KeyArena that owner Howard Schultz has called one of the worst in the league.
“I’m stating the obvious here, but we don’t have unlimited resources,” Walker said. “Some (other teams) have more than we do, but we’re used to that. That’s been the case here since I’ve been around.
“But we’ve also got a situation where we have a lot of people that we’ve impressed with,” he said. “The people we want to reward and keep around are the people who help us win games and help their teammates be better. We’ve got a whole host of people like that, and given that we’ve got to try.”
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
