Schultz’s Sonics suit is just PR

Fair Game

By kerry eggers

The Portland Tribune, Apr 22, 2008, Updated Oct 30, 2009 (2 Reader comments)

SCHULTZ

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So Howard Schultz is preparing a lawsuit against Clay Bennett in an effort to rescind the July 2006 sale of the Seattle SuperSonics.

Schultz says he wants the Sonics back. He says Bennett and his ownership group promised that they hoped to keep the team in Seattle. Schultz never dreamed Bennett would move the Sonics to his hometown, Oklahoma City, Okla., which had housed the vagabond New Orleans Hornets for two seasons.

Sure. And you must also believe that Starbucks is going to drop its price for a venti chai latte from $3.70 to $1.

Schultz sold the Sonics for the inflated price of $350 million when he could have gotten $275 million from a Seattle group. That’s a seller’s prerogative.

But don’t claim now that you thought Bennett would honor the KeyArena lease that runs through 2010 and do everything he could to keep the franchise in Seattle.

Partner Aubrey McClendon’s comments to the Business Journal of Oklahoma City last August, along with e-mails obtained by the city of Seattle in anticipation of a June 16 lawsuit to hold the Sonics to the remaining two seasons of the lease, prove otherwise.

Schultz’s threatened lawsuit is merely posturing, a blatant PR move to save face among the citizenry of Seattle, which is going to lose a franchise it deserves to retain.

NBA Commissioner David Stern, upset that the city of Seattle didn’t approve public funding for a new arena, has backed Bennett all along the way through this fiasco. Stern ought to be ashamed.

• Good news for Oregon State fans: KPAM (860 AM) has received approval from the Federal Communications Commission to boost the station’s nighttime signal from 5 kilowatts to 15 kilowatts. The increase of power, combined with antenna gain at night, will enhance the station’s reach in the metro area and the Willamette Valley.

Construction with new equipment necessary for the signal enhancement will start in early summer and should be completed by mid-September, according to Paul Clithero, general manager for Pamplin Broadcasting, which is owned by the same company as the Portland Tribune.

• Oregon State’s baseball series finale at Arizona State on Sunday was joined in progress by KUIK (1360 AM) after its NASCAR programming. If there is anything better than auto racing in person, it has to be listening to it on the radio.

It’s the final year of KUIK’s contract, thank goodness. Beaver baseball moves to KPAM next spring.

• Jay Allen, the KXL (750 AM) sports director who hosted the Blazers’ post-game show this season, maintains an appropriate air of levity, often poking fun at broadcast partners Antonio Harvey and Michael Holton. After kidding around with Harvey on a late-season broadcast, Allen directed a good-natured barb in the direction of radio play-by-play voice Brian Wheeler.

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