The Seattle SuperSonics won their court case and are now Oklahoma City's NBA team.
By Jeff Latzke
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — More than a week after announcing their planned move to Oklahoma City, the Seattle SuperSonics don’t know where they’ll practice, where their offices will be or even what they’ll be called.
General manager Sam Presti hopes he’ll be able to get at least one of those questions answered after arriving in town to join team owner Clay Bennett.
Presti’s first order of business will be visiting potential sites where the team can practice until a new $25 million facility can be built at a yet-to-be-determined location.
“That facility is going to be the place where a lot of hard work and sweat takes place, so finding one that suits our needs from a basketball standpoint, potentially from an officing standpoint, and all of the other facets of a basketball operation is not a short order,” Presti said Thursday in a news conference held down the street from Bennett’s office.
“We’re going to try to look and find the best place, and I’m sure that we will.”
When that — or any of the other tasks that must be completed in the team’s transition — will be completed is still uncertain. Unlike when the New Orleans Hornets were displaced to Oklahoma City after Hurricane Katrina hit in late August 2005, there are still a few months to go before training camp.
Presti has been placed in charge of transitioning the basketball operation from Seattle to Oklahoma City, while interim president Danny Barth will oversee the business side.
He talked about the team’s patient approach to molding a contender in the Western Conference after a franchise-worst 20-win season, and that philosophy seems to be carrying over to the relocation.
Presti said the timeline for finding a temporary practice facility “will be when we find the place we feel like is the right spot for us.”
“We don’t want to make a quick or rash decision because it’s a big decision for us, and there’s a lot of options,” Presti said.
Office space for the team could be downtown, where the Hornets holed up during their two-year stay in Oklahoma City, or ideally it could be at the practice facility.
And the team name? Will it be Barons, Thunderbirds, Marshals, Outlaws or something else?
“That’s stuff that’s coming. It’s not really anything that I’m directly involved in. Until that gets announced, I guess, officially, we’ll be waiting,” Presti said.
“We’re more concerned with what’s inside the jersey than what’s on the outside for us right now. I’m sure we’ll have a great name.”
The name decision rests at least partially in the NBA’s New York office, where advisers are checking out licensing and copyright issues on whatever names are in the running. Players have been wearing black-and-white jerseys with Oklahoma City on the front during summer league games this week.
And when will the moving vans and the team’s workers start rolling into town?
“I don’t know that I can put a definite or definitive time on that other than to say that we’ve really made an effort to make sure that the process is well thought out and efficient so that people are supported throughout,” Presti said. “I think that will happen fairly quickly, but I can’t give you a definite timeframe on it.”
About all that Presti could say for sure about the transition was that the team is working with all deliberate speed.
“It’s definitely a job but it’s one that we’re excited to take on. We’re going to a place that we’re going to call home. As we make this transition, we want to make sure we do it the right way. We’re excited about it.
“Our sleeves,” Presti said, glancing down at the turned-back cuffs on his pale blue shirt, “are literally rolled up, and we’re ready to go to work.”
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