A decision on possible NBA expansion is due next year, and Las Vegas and Seattle are at the head of the line should the league open the door to new franchises, commissioner Adam Silver acknowledged on Tuesday.
Silver spoke ahead of the NBA Cup final in Las Vegas.
“It’s not a secret we’re looking at this market in Las Vegas,” Silver said. “We are looking at Seattle. We’ve looked at other markets, as well. I’d say I want to be sensitive there about this notion that we’re somehow teasing these markets, because I know we’ve been talking about it for a while. …
“We’re in the process of working with our (existing) teams and gauging the level of interest and having a better understanding of what the economics would be on the ground for those particular teams and what a pro forma would look like for them. And then sometime in 2026, we’ll make a determination.”
The NBA last expanded in 2004 with the arrival of the Charlotte Bobcats as the 30th team. Charlotte previously had a team, the Hornets, that relocated to New Orleans. Seattle hopes to follow a similar pattern, as it lost the SuperSonics to Oklahoma City in 2008.
Las Vegas has never been home to an NBA franchise, but it has close ties to the league as the site of a summer league and as the host of the NBA Cup semifinals and final the past few years.
“I think Seattle and Las Vegas are two incredible cities,” Silver said. “Obviously, we had a team in Seattle that had great success. We have a WNBA team here in Las Vegas in the Aces. We’ve been playing the summer league here for 20 years. We’re playing our Cup games here, so we’re very familiar with this market.
“I don’t have any doubt that Las Vegas, despite all of the other major league teams that are here now, the other entertainment properties, that this city could support an NBA team.”
Silver addressed other league topics:
–The NBA commissioner said he is closely monitoring the collective-bargaining talks between the WNBA and its players union.
“As I’ve said before, we, the NBA, WNBA collective, acknowledged that our players deserve to be paid significantly more than they have so far based on the increased success of the league, and it’s just a question now of finding a meeting of the minds in terms of what is a fair deal,” he said. “It’s going to require compromise on both sides. I remain optimistic we’ll get something done.”
–The Miami Heat might be granted salary-cap relief related to the absence of Terry Rozier. The guard is on leave after he was charged with alerting gamblers he would leave a game early, allowing them to cash in on prop bets regarding his statistics. Rozier pleaded not guilty in federal court last week.
“We’re going to try to work something through, work this out with them, but there’s no obvious solution here,” Silver said. “I would just say that there’s no doubt at the moment they have a player that can’t perform services for them. … Obviously, he hasn’t been convicted of anything yet either — but this is an unfortunate circumstance. Sometimes there’s these unique events and maybe sometimes they require a unique solution.”
–Silver disputed assertions that the NBA Cup is overloading the players.
“All I can deal with is the data itself, and the data we have so far this season is we have the lowest number of injuries in the last three years,” Silver said.
