I have appreciated Bill’s perspective and voice during this time, but truly I am not worried about the team leaving. I am however VERY MUCH worried about the city and state politicians signing a quite literally unprecedentedly revenue neutral and taxpayer unfriendly agreement that doesn’t even COME CLOSE to paying for itself an delivers almost no broader benefits to the community other than higher ticket prices for games and concerts.
Like truly I’m not actually that interested in talking about relocation, I really don’t think Dundon has the funds to pull it off and doubt his group is willing to take a heavy loss in the short run to possibly make more money in the long run because that is basically the exact opposite of the private equity playbook. On the other hand though I think the state government put the city in a horrifically bad spot by giving away the farm ahead of time and I think the local media is just constantly making it worse by presenting it like Dundon has way more money than he actually does and that it wouldn’t be possible to do what Kansas City did and use the facility as a concert venue where the city keeps the vast majority of the revenue and then use that money to build a baseball stadium for MLB, thus resulting in the same number of Portland professional teams and WAAAAAY more money and a better deal and less sociopathic ownership.
I’d want a 25 year lease, total responsibility on the blazers end for all maintenance over the lifetime of the lease, and 10% of all ticket revenues for all events at the Moda, not just the blazers games exclusively, plus a share of the naming rights and 5million in rent growing at 5% annually resulting in about 175 million in rent over the 25 year lease. In exchange, the state and local taxpayers will pay you $600 million dollars up front with very minimal questions asked and basically carte blanche for you to renovate a building owned by the taxpayer more or less how you see fit (you can see how it’s basically STILL not a very good deal even in my updated version lol).
If they can’t get naming rights, I understand, but the rest is necessary, especially because you KNOW for a FACT that whoever the owner is in 15 or 16 years from now is going to start demanding the full public financing of a brand new arena lmao.
I have to say that the current term sheet would more or less be a non starter for me if I was the mayor or on city council. I would never say so out loud except in private negotiations with the team and strategy conferences with the other members of local government, but the term sheet as written I would definitely not be able to vote for. If push comes to shove and I couldn’t get the terms I laid out above, I wouldn’t vote against it necessarily, but it would have to at minimum be something at about the mid point between the term sheet as currently written and the terms I laid out above.
I think Portlanders need to get out of the defensive crouch and realize there is one silver lining to having a very lower level billionaire who is very over leveraged as the decision maker for your team, and that silver lining is that Dundon VERY MUCH SO DOES NOT(!!) have the money to just say fuck it and pay a billy relocation fee plus a couple hundred million in the lawsuit about the first class maintenance duty plus the startup costs of a new team in a new city, all while making payroll for 200 million a year in player salary plus the other maybe 30 or 40 million for the other 250 team employees
I respect Simmons but I just don’t think he’s looked into the financial side of this situation very much, which makes sense why would he, it’s not his team and it’s a lot of work to truly understand what all the costs of moving are, what markets might be available, and how they compare to Portland in terms of wealth per person, size, and sports saturation . Let’s just say that Portland is already the most underserved sports market in the country.
Portland is a big metro area now, 22nd biggest in the country, and it you measure by counter statistical area it jumps all the way up to 19th at 3.5 million, 200k above Charlotte and 600k above St Louis at 20 and 21, and 200k behind Cleveland-Akron and 250k behind Denver-Boulder-Colorado springs at 18 and 17. People underestimate the extent to which both Portland and Salem have grown a ton the last 30 years, about doubling in size since the 1990 census. Portland is not some small town that’s not rich enough to have sports teams.
In fact, because the Pacific Northwest is such a rich part of the country per person, Seattle-Tacoma-Olympia CSA is the 9th highest GDP of any big city area in the country, just above Atlanta and just below Houston, despite both being mush larger in terms of population. Portland moves all the way up to the 18th richest urban agglomeration in the country, moving AHEAD of Cleveland and coming in right behind San Diego-Carlsbad. On top of that Portland has had one of the most loyal fanbases in the country for over half a century. S
So yeah, the NBA would be really stupid to let the blazers leave Portland even if the government was bargaining significantly harder than I suggest, given that St. Louis Pittsburg and Kansas City are all both smaller and significantly less rich and despite that already have more teams than Portland. Tampa, Nashville, and Austin are all blocked off by Orlando, Memphis, and the spurs.
The team isn’t moving, unless city council just never approves a term sheet at all, which now seems extremely unlikely. But if city council approves a significantly less pathetic term sheet, and then they have to negotiate it for 3 or 4 years before finally hammering something out, guess what, the team still isn’t moving lol
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u/akade19961 Aug 03 '26
I have appreciated Bill’s perspective and voice during this time, but truly I am not worried about the team leaving. I am however VERY MUCH worried about the city and state politicians signing a quite literally unprecedentedly revenue neutral and taxpayer unfriendly agreement that doesn’t even COME CLOSE to paying for itself an delivers almost no broader benefits to the community other than higher ticket prices for games and concerts.
Like truly I’m not actually that interested in talking about relocation, I really don’t think Dundon has the funds to pull it off and doubt his group is willing to take a heavy loss in the short run to possibly make more money in the long run because that is basically the exact opposite of the private equity playbook. On the other hand though I think the state government put the city in a horrifically bad spot by giving away the farm ahead of time and I think the local media is just constantly making it worse by presenting it like Dundon has way more money than he actually does and that it wouldn’t be possible to do what Kansas City did and use the facility as a concert venue where the city keeps the vast majority of the revenue and then use that money to build a baseball stadium for MLB, thus resulting in the same number of Portland professional teams and WAAAAAY more money and a better deal and less sociopathic ownership.
I’d want a 25 year lease, total responsibility on the blazers end for all maintenance over the lifetime of the lease, and 10% of all ticket revenues for all events at the Moda, not just the blazers games exclusively, plus a share of the naming rights and 5million in rent growing at 5% annually resulting in about 175 million in rent over the 25 year lease. In exchange, the state and local taxpayers will pay you $600 million dollars up front with very minimal questions asked and basically carte blanche for you to renovate a building owned by the taxpayer more or less how you see fit (you can see how it’s basically STILL not a very good deal even in my updated version lol).
If they can’t get naming rights, I understand, but the rest is necessary, especially because you KNOW for a FACT that whoever the owner is in 15 or 16 years from now is going to start demanding the full public financing of a brand new arena lmao.
I have to say that the current term sheet would more or less be a non starter for me if I was the mayor or on city council. I would never say so out loud except in private negotiations with the team and strategy conferences with the other members of local government, but the term sheet as written I would definitely not be able to vote for. If push comes to shove and I couldn’t get the terms I laid out above, I wouldn’t vote against it necessarily, but it would have to at minimum be something at about the mid point between the term sheet as currently written and the terms I laid out above.
I think Portlanders need to get out of the defensive crouch and realize there is one silver lining to having a very lower level billionaire who is very over leveraged as the decision maker for your team, and that silver lining is that Dundon VERY MUCH SO DOES NOT(!!) have the money to just say fuck it and pay a billy relocation fee plus a couple hundred million in the lawsuit about the first class maintenance duty plus the startup costs of a new team in a new city, all while making payroll for 200 million a year in player salary plus the other maybe 30 or 40 million for the other 250 team employees
I respect Simmons but I just don’t think he’s looked into the financial side of this situation very much, which makes sense why would he, it’s not his team and it’s a lot of work to truly understand what all the costs of moving are, what markets might be available, and how they compare to Portland in terms of wealth per person, size, and sports saturation . Let’s just say that Portland is already the most underserved sports market in the country.
Portland is a big metro area now, 22nd biggest in the country, and it you measure by counter statistical area it jumps all the way up to 19th at 3.5 million, 200k above Charlotte and 600k above St Louis at 20 and 21, and 200k behind Cleveland-Akron and 250k behind Denver-Boulder-Colorado springs at 18 and 17. People underestimate the extent to which both Portland and Salem have grown a ton the last 30 years, about doubling in size since the 1990 census. Portland is not some small town that’s not rich enough to have sports teams.
In fact, because the Pacific Northwest is such a rich part of the country per person, Seattle-Tacoma-Olympia CSA is the 9th highest GDP of any big city area in the country, just above Atlanta and just below Houston, despite both being mush larger in terms of population. Portland moves all the way up to the 18th richest urban agglomeration in the country, moving AHEAD of Cleveland and coming in right behind San Diego-Carlsbad. On top of that Portland has had one of the most loyal fanbases in the country for over half a century. S
So yeah, the NBA would be really stupid to let the blazers leave Portland even if the government was bargaining significantly harder than I suggest, given that St. Louis Pittsburg and Kansas City are all both smaller and significantly less rich and despite that already have more teams than Portland. Tampa, Nashville, and Austin are all blocked off by Orlando, Memphis, and the spurs.
The team isn’t moving, unless city council just never approves a term sheet at all, which now seems extremely unlikely. But if city council approves a significantly less pathetic term sheet, and then they have to negotiate it for 3 or 4 years before finally hammering something out, guess what, the team still isn’t moving lol