Blogger rips the Maloofs -Let me tell you about “your business”

Do they deserve to get another team that has demonstrated it has no loyalty? That's like marrying an adulteress.

 

The Grizzlies owners thought the same thing moving the Grizzlies to Memphis to share the FedEx Forum with the Tigers. The Tigers were/are a better basketball product and the college team had much better attendance than the NBA team. The city is simply a college-sport town, similar to Austin.

 

There is no way they would be the 3rd wheel to the Clippers. Even if they were, it's a business decision. The clippers and lakers are the most profitable teams in the league, even though the Clippers owner has a bad reputation. While teams in the small cities are losing millions every season.

 

It's anyone's guess who would be 3rd wheel but I believe it would be the Kings. The Clippers have the most dynamic young player in the game. They're also the better team right now (by 7.5 games). The Kings have two extremely talented young players (Evans and Cousins) but they play gawd-awful terrible, undisciplined basketball. Who would be rushing to switch allegiances to a team winning 28% of their games?

From the business side, the Clippers probably make money in no small part to the Staples Center. That's a wealth of high price seats and boxes. I doubt Honda Center would make the Kings the same amount of money even if they could draw a similar crowd. The Kings would stand to be screwed in the TV contract too. They'll have no leverage; an unknown and/or small fanbase and the fact that they'd have to compete with the Lakers/Clips for airtime.

 

Actually, Memphis had better attendance when the Tigers were doing well. At least from what I remember. Also they had a decent team then. The attendance started really dropping in Memphis when they traded Shane and then Pau. They have gotten very little of that dropped attendance back.

http://www.databasebasketball.com/teams/teamatt.htm?tm=mem&lg=n

 

I don't oppose the move, or even the move to Anaheim, but I do think the rhetorics used by the Maloofs is rather poor.

When basketball teams want fans to buy tickets and other team products, it's "Come support YOUR team!!! We are HOUSTON!!!" when the same fans and city work to keep the team in town, the team is all of a sudden "OUR business."

Yes, I know you paid for the team and I recognize you are losing real money on it, but it just seems to be bad form to be selling fans on loyalty when you are just running the team like any random Wal Mart.

 

Those probably aren't the "in attendance" numbers.

http://www.memphisflyer.com/CityBeatBlog/archives/2009/07/10/beware-of-rosy-attendance-numbers

My sister has lived in Memphis for 4 years now and she says that Grizzlies game were never even close to as well attended as Tigers games. During the early years, Grizzlies game were often less than half full.

I do admit when I was up in Memphis over Christmas the FedEx Forum was probably 65-70% full during the Raptors game I went to. Fans are going now when the Grizzlies are good and the Tigers aren't.

 

He has points but they're not really persuasive. The fact is that the message that is clearly being sent is that if you want your team to stay, you need to support them as a city. The fans supported the games themselves, but Sacramento never came close to successfully putting together help for a stadium for the Kings (I followed that issue for a while because I found it interesting that the Kings might end up in Vegas). And ironically, now when they Kings are leaving, they finally talk about getting a stadium to get another team? If they had helped with a stadium for the Kings, the Kings wouldn't have looked to leave in the first place. This issue has been prominent for YEARS and each time the Kings try to get a proposition for financing they get a sorry, build your own stadium. The cost of having a professional team, keeping the related citizens employed and raising the profile of a small city is, unfortuntely, helping them with a stadium situation that is competitive. If you own a franchise that is losing money rapidly, you are in a small market, and your city officials repeatedly turn you down for help with a stadium when other cities have helped other teams with stadiums (either new, co-financed, loans, modifications, etc.), then you have the right to seek to go elsewhere rather than bleed millions of dollars each year. It does suck for the Kings fans, and I am sympathetic to them because they are great basketball fans. However, I am not fully sympathetic because they should have made it very clear to their business and political leaders that keeping the Kings in town was a priority. It was not, and therefore the politicians couldn't get the needed support to get financing, and this is the direct result. Had Houston not built the Toyota Center, I believe the Rockets would be gone. As for Anaheim, yes they would be a third team, but it is a big market. I strongly suspect the number crunchers at the Kings have done the math and know the franchise will still do well in LA as opposed to another small market. I could also see the Kings becoming a second wheel, depending on what happens with Griffin and how the Kings rebuild. For example, if you were Griffin and you could stay in LA (but not with the Lakers), when you become a free agent would you stick with the racist skinflint Donald Sterling or would you go with the Kings, whose owners are far better in comparison?

 

Great post.

You make it sound like the situation is not all that different from Bud Adams and the Oilers during the last days in Houston. Except Sactown has the small-town issue to deal with.

My problem will the Maloofs is that they haven't done anything with the franchise since the Webber/Divac days. Very few fans are going to ardently petition for the city to use public financing when the team itself is garbage. Yes I said garbage. Despite having two incredibly talented top 5 picks, they win 28% of their games. Their coach is terrible and the management doesn't appear any better (Rockets have gotten the better end of every trade with them).

It's almost chicken and the eggish. Owners don't want to spend money improving a team with little fan support and the fans/city don't want to raise money for a team that sucks.

 

The Kings had nothing going for them in Sacramento. They were 29th in attendance. Sacramento had nothing going for it. Anything is better than that. It's a larger population, even if they sold out on games against the Lakers, and Clippers. That's higher attendance right there. It doesn't take into account other teams.

If playoff teams like the Hornets can't stop from losing money in a small market, then they will just move. It doesn't even matter if your all-star is CP3 or Blake Griffin, it's money lost.
It's either that or somebody buys the team at a loss and moves the team, anyway.