Toward the end of last week, a journalist who covers the Oklahoma City Thunder wrote a tough-talking column about something he believes that team’s fans are owed.
“If they want their Sonics’ history back, an apology is in order,” wrote Clemente Almanza of the USA Today Sports Media Group. “That’s what happens when you have nearly two decades of misguided anger.”
This understandably evoked a strong reaction in the Pacific Northwest.
I have to admit something, though: I found it embarrassingly satisfying.
After the Thunder won the NBA title last season, I worried that my 18 years of unrepentant hatred had all been for naught. I’m glad to know at least one dude got his feelings hurt.
Then, I began to ponder a more logistical question.
If we were to apologize – which we absolutely won’t, by the way – who would be the one appointed to say sorry on our behalf?
No way we’d put Mr. Sonic Nate McMillan through that sort of humiliation ritual.
The mayor of Seattle? Perhaps.
The governor of Washington? Sure.
Wait, I know. How about Sir Mix-A-Lot?
Then, just before he utters the apology, he could turn around and request a smooch of the exact body part whose virtues he extolled in his classic love ballad “Baby Got Back.”
The mere idea that Oklahoma City could or should hold history hostage is kind of fitting when you think about it. There was never much in the way of good-faith bargaining once Howard Schultz sold our region out.
But here we are, 18 years later on the brink of being invited back into the NBA.
I know, you’ve heard that before. Many times in fact. But this time it’s actually on the agenda.
When the NBA’s Board of Governors meets this week in New York, there will be a motion to allow commissioner Adam Silver to begin discussing expansion with potential ownership groups for franchises in Seattle and Las Vegas. It’s considered a lock to get 23 votes from among the 30 teams, which is the minimum needed for approval.
A formal vote on expansion could occur later this year, and the new franchises could enter the league in 2028-29.
How’s that going to feel?
By then, it will have been 20 years since an NBA team played in this state. That’s an entire generation of fans who’ve grown up with the green and gold as a retro-wear memory.
Our region has changed so much in that time. So has the league.
It is more wide open than it was before, both in terms of game flow and title contention. It’s faster, the scores are higher. Over the past seven seasons, seven different teams have won a championship. The dominant big men like Nikola Jokic and Victor Wembanyama now shoot 3s and pass like point guards.
It is, I believe, a more compelling product, but there are people who won’t ever come back to the league, and I get it.
It was dirty the way it went down. Not just because Schultz sold us out, but because the league’s commissioner – David Stern – seemingly wanted to teach Seattle a lesson. At the very least, he didn’t care about seeing the franchise ripped out by its roots.
It left a void in the region. A black hole that showed us as much as we may care about these teams, as much as they trade on being a civic institution, they are actually owned and controlled by men in suits who won’t think twice about lying if it allows them to get what they want.
We all saw the emails from Clay Bennett and his cronies. We had to spend years listening to Oklahoma City fans allege that Seattle hadn’t supported its team when the fact was the Sonics’ exit had nothing to do with attendance and everything to do with public funding for a new arena.
I’m not asking for any apologies, though. That would be silly. That would be soft.
Being a sports fan is not a rational enterprise, at least not in my opinion, and while the managing editor of USA Today’s ThunderWire may find my anger misguided, I don’t intend to dial it back.
My favorite moment in the NBA over the past 18 years came when the Thunder blew a 3-1 lead to the Golden State Warriors in 2016 Western Conference finals.
My second favorite moment came a couple of months later when Kevin Durant left Oklahoma City as a free agent, signing with the Warriors.
My third favorite moment was when Damien Lillard made a jump shot from Bangladesh to knock the Thunder out of the playoffs in 2019 and trigger a rebuilding process.
As delicious as those moments were, they won’t compare to what it will feel like the first time a team in green-and-gold uniforms takes the floor against the Thunder in the shadow of the Space Needle.
I don’t need the permission of anyone in Oklahoma City to understand or to appreciate the Sonics’ 40-year history here in Seattle, and I’m certainly not going to forget the circumstances of their departure.
Sorry, Oklahoma City, but I’m not sorry.