A report Sunday that Steve Ballmer was in Los Angeles for a meeting to discuss buying the Clippers is a big deal for Seattle basketball fans.
No, not because Ballmer is going to move the Clippers to Seattle. Ballmer himself has already stated, as would most semi-competent businessmen, that he’d keep the Clippers in the City of Angels.
It’s highly unlikely Ballmer would risk harming the value of a moneymaking Clippers franchise so recklessly by moving them here, given the $1 billion price tag he’d likely pay to get the team. Nor much chance the NBA would allow Ballmer to pull a Clay Bennett out of the nation’s second-biggest market.
Still, this is a big deal for Seattle, if only in what it means for Chris Hansen and his efforts to build a Sodo arena and revive the NBA here. Up until now, those efforts have been with Ballmer and his billions at Hansen’s side.
If Ballmer heads for Los Angeles as a Clippers owner, it effectively ends any NBA role he’d play here and deals a serious blow to Hansen’s plan.
“It would knock the lights out of it,’’ a veteran Seattle politico said Sunday. “There are deep pockets and there are small pockets. It doesn’t take much work to figure out who has the deep pockets and who has the small ones in that partnership.’’
Now, it isn’t automatically a death blow. After all, Hansen first launched his Sodo project well before Ballmer climbed aboard. But there’s a reason Hansen took Ballmer on as his biggest partner in the first place: money talks in pro sports.
And it’s fair to wonder whether Hansen has enough of his own money to go at it without Ballmer. Or whether he’ll again be out working the wealthy side of the street for help.
Hansen could not immediately be reached for comment through his spokesman, Rollin Fatland.
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