Will this save the Sonics??
sennin
Posts: 2,146
http://emeraldcitycenter.com/
I'd love to see this happen!
...or is this some kind of April fools joke??
I'd love to see this happen!
...or is this some kind of April fools joke??
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http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/0-32-38/Reading-Clay-Bennett-s-E-Mail.html
Clay is an ass.
"David you know how I feel about our relationship both personally and professionally. You are among a very few, notwithstanding our relative brief actual physical time together that have significantly affected my life."
LOL!
Not sure he will be now.....but you never know.
Those email's are hilarious! Bennett makes Stern look like a fool! haha!
4 months later Bennet emailed Stern telling him that he's never discussed moving the Sonics with anyone...ever.
By GREG JOHNS AND CASEY MCNERTHNEY
P-I REPORTERS
A lawyer for former Sonics owner Howard Schultz confirmed late Monday that the Starbucks chief is considering filing a lawsuit to recover the team from Oklahoma City businessman Clay Bennett.
Attorney Richard Yarmuth confirmed Monday that his Seattle-based law firm, Yarmuth Wilsdon Calfo, is representing Schultz and plans to file a lawsuit against Bennett to get the Sonics back. Yarmuth did not say in which court he plans to file the suit.
Schultz sold the team to Bennett in July 2006.
At the time, Bennett pledged to make a good-faith effort to keep the franchise in Seattle. E-mails recently obtained by Seattle attorneys suggest that Bennett and his ownership group intended all along to move the team to Oklahoma City.
Earlier Monday, NBA Commissioner David Stern threw his support behind Bennett again, leaving the question now as to whether there is any life left in Seattle's bid to persuade league owners to vote later this week against relocation to Oklahoma City.
Stern, speaking Monday on a national conference call, said nothing had changed in his feeling toward Bennett or his intentions following last week's release of revealing e-mails between the Oklahoma City ownership group members.
The commissioner absolved Bennett of any wrongdoing despite e-mails showing conversations among the team's partners about moving the team out of Seattle before the completion of a one-year "good faith" commitment to finding a local arena solution.
"I haven't studied them," Stern said of the e-mails, "but my sense of it was that Clay, as the managing partner and driving force of the group, was operating in good faith under the agreement that he made with Howard Schultz. His straight-and-narrow path may not have been shared by all his partners in their views, but Clay was the one making policy for the partnership."
Former Sen. Slade Gorton, whose K&L Gates law firm is representing the city in its lawsuit against the team, said he couldn't comment on Stern's latest views or anything involving the case.
Gorton did say he continues to look into ways to present Seattle's case to NBA owners before their relocation vote Thursday and Friday, despite the recent failure of the city's bid for state help on a $300 million KeyArena remodel.
"I don't ever want to say never," Gorton said. "Lots of things tend to happen in the face of a deadline. Right now I don't know of something else to put before the NBA Board of Governors, but I am still working on finding something."
Gov. Chris Gregoire is drafting a letter to the NBA, according to a spokesman, that will be co-signed by numerous political leaders in the state in an effort to present a case for keeping the Sonics in Seattle.
Meanwhile, the Sonics sent a letter of their own on Monday to season ticket holders saying no renewals will be accepted until the team's future is clarified.
"With the current uncertainty surrounding the team's status about playing in Seattle for the 2008-09 season, we feel the prudent course of action is to wait until this matter is resolved before presenting you with renewal information," the letter said.
Stern's absolution of Bennett's position in regard to his partners seemingly ignores an April 17, 2007, e-mail exchange between Bennett and minority owners Aubrey McClendon and Tom Ward. That e-mail chain, exchanged shortly after the Legislature declined to approve the group's bid for a $500 million arena in Renton, began with Ward asking Bennett if there was "any way to move here (to Oklahoma City) for next season or are we doomed to have another lame-duck season in Seattle?"
Bennett replied: "I am a man possessed! Will do everything we can. Thanks for hanging with me boys, the game is getting started!"
But Bennett wasn't the only one working on things before the completion of a yearlong period following the July 18, 2006, sale from Schultz's ownership group to the Oklahoma City investors.
Among the e-mails obtained last week is one dated June 11, 2007, from Bennett to Ward in which they talk about the city of Seattle's willingness to negotiate an early out to the KeyArena lease.
"Is Seattle negotiating the release of the arena?" Ward asked Bennett.
"We had begun initial discussions which the deputy mayor was receptive to," Bennett replied. "The buzz around the draft pick caused the mayor last week to put the brakes on things. I had a lengthy talk with Stern on Saturday. We are in Seattle next season."
The Sonics went on to select Kevin Durant with the No. 2 pick in the draft later that month, the team played the current season in KeyArena and Mayor Greg Nickels took a firm stance that the city would not negotiate any buyout and would instead fight in court to bind the team to Seattle through its 2010 lease expiration date.
Bennett then e-mailed Stern on Aug. 17, 2007, and claimed he and his partners had "never discussed moving the Sonics to Oklahoma City." He insisted he was continuing to give Seattle until an Oct. 31 deadline to find an arena solution.
"If we are unsuccessful at the end of the time frame, we will then evaluate our options," Bennett wrote. "I have never wavered and will not."
The city's trial with the Sonics owners begins June 16.
The NBA is expected to vote on Bennett's relocation request to Oklahoma City this Thursday or Friday, contingent on the outcome of the trial or some other sort of resolution of the KeyArena lease.
Stern has already indicated that a group of three owners who visited Oklahoma City would recommend the move be approved.
Asked Monday if he'd ever suggested to Bennett that he should consider selling the team to another ownership group that might be able to make things work in Seattle, the commissioner indicated that ship sailed when no local buyers stepped up two years ago.
The former owner of the Seattle SuperSonics plans to sue the current owners to get the team back, arguing they breached a condition of the sale to make a "good-faith effort" to keep Seattle's oldest pro sports franchise from leaving town, according to Seattle-area media reports.
Starbucks chairman and CEO Howard Schultz, who sold the Sonics to an Oklahoma City-based group led by Clay Bennett, will not seek monetary damages, but wants the team back, according to his attorney, Richard Yarmuth.
"It's not money damage. It's to have the team returned," Yarmuth said, according to The Seattle Times. "The theory of the suit is that when the team was sold, the Basketball Club of Seattle, our team here, relied on promises made by Clay Bennett and his ownership that they desired to keep the team in Seattle and intended to make a good-faith effort to accomplish that."
The team's ownership group has sought NBA approval to move the team to Oklahoma City for next season. The city has taken the team to court to enforce its lease at Key Arena, which runs through September 2010.
The lawsuit, expected to be filed in the next two weeks, comes after the city obtained and made public e-mails among members of the current Sonics ownership group, in which they are seen privately discussing a move to Oklahoma City at the same time they were publicly pledging to continue "good-faith" efforts to remain in Seattle.
After purchasing the team and the WNBA's Seattle Storm from Schultz in July, 2006 for $350 million, Bennett promised to spend one full year after the purchase was approved to seek a viable home for the Sonics in Seattle. The NBA approved the sale of the Sonics in October 2006.
Bennett's trips to Washington state to lobby for a proposed $500 million arena in suburban Renton and his hiring of a Seattle-based lobbyist and architectural firm have no bearing on the lawsuit, Yarmuth told The Times.
"We're talking about fraud at the time the contract was signed," Yarmuth said, according to the newspaper. "It's not merely what activities, good faith or otherwise, were engaged in after the contract was signed so far as lobbying for a new stadium."
Bennett and ownership partners Aubrey McClendon and Tom Ward exchanged e-mails in April 2007 in which they discussed whether there was any way to avoid further "lame duck" seasons in Seattle before the team could be relocated.
Bennett responded: "I am a man possessed! Will do everything we can. Thanks for hanging with me boys."
Four months later, after McClendon was quoted by an Oklahoma publication that "we didn't buy the team to keep it in Seattle; we hoped to come here," Bennett told NBA commissioner David Stern in an e-mail that the group had not discussed a move to Oklahoma City.
"I haven't studied them but my sense of it was that Clay, as the managing partner and the driving force of the group, was operating in good faith under the agreement that had been made with Howard Schultz," Stern said on a conference call Monday. "His straight and narrow path may not have been shared by all of his partners in their views, but Clay was the one that was making policy for the partnership."
The NBA's owners are expected to vote on the proposed Sonics move Friday. The league's relocation committee has already approved the move.
Sonics only won one NBA title, Mariners never won WS title yet, nor has the Seahawks ever won the Superbowl.
The Mariners in the 90's had some great all-stars like Randy Johnso, Griffey Jr, and A-Rod but all left town without bringing a ring. Gary Payton got his ring in Miami instead. I'm there's more sad sports stories of Seattle to go on. And now the only championship team is leaving town(perhaps, most likely). Totally sucks man.
EV- 08/09,10/2008.06/08,09/2009
Gregoire asks NBA to postpone Sonics decision
By GREG JOHNS
P-I REPORTER
Gov. Chris Gregoire and a group of the state's leading politicians sent a letter to the NBA on Tuesday asking Commissioner David Stern and the league owners to postpone Friday's vote on relocating the Sonics to Oklahoma City.
The letter asks that the relocation decision be delayed until legal and financial issues surrounding the Sonics and their arena situation are resolved.
The letter cites a breach of contract regarding the purchase agreement of the team from Clay Bennett and his Oklahoma partnership in regard, as well as a breach of faith with fans of Seattle.
In addition to Gregoire, the letter is signed by House Speaker Frank Chopp, Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, King County Executive Ron Sims and Seattle City Council President Richard Conlin.
The letter comes a day after the lawyer for former Sonics owner Howard Schultz said he intends to sue Bennett's group for breach of contract.
"I have to believe that if we were negotiating in good faith, there would have been a reasonable chance of getting something done," Gregoire said. "The current owners never gave us that opportunity."
The letter, addressed to Stern, says the group wishes to "express our united support for NBA basketball in Seattle," cites the advantages of keeping a team in the Northwest and emphasizes the city's "validly enforceable lease."
"These factors lead to the very strong conclusion that any move of the team away from Seattle would be a breach of faith with the fans, breach of contract with the previous owners, a violation of the lease with the city and contrary to the league's stated intentions regarding franchise relocation," the letter states.
"We, therefore, respectfully request that you remove the relocation issue from your agenda until the many complicated legal and financial matters can be worked out. In any event, we ask that relocation be rejected or in the alternative that no decision be made at this time on relocation of our team. We recognize that these decisions are difficult but we believe Seattle's significant history in the NBA and its strategic position in the global marketplace are worthy of your serious consideration as you move forward."
NBA spokesman Tim Frank, speaking before the letter was announced, said the relocation committee has already sent its report and recommendation to league owners. A formal presentation will be made to the owners at Friday's Board of Governors meeting in New York and the 30 owners will then vote on the move, with a simple majority of 16 needed for approval.
Jeff will save us!
http://www.myspace.com/brain_of_c
http://i22.photobucket.com/albums/b329/PJ_Calgary/funny/you-have-annoyed-monkey.jpg
fans of any team should care.
this sets a pretty bad precedent.
(Important note: The Celtics were forced to carry Reggie Lewis on their cap for three years after he passed away, as well as Vin Baker for three years after everyone agreed he was showing up drunk for practices. Somehow, Portland is allowed to wipe Miles off its cap because of a career-ending knee injury? Whaaaaaaaaaat? I'm starting the conspiracy theory that David Stern needed the Blazers to be good because he wanted Seattle to have a good team close by after Clay Bennett hijacked the Sonics, so he rigged the 2007 lottery and made this insane Miles decision. Now the Blazers are going to have the best young team in the league and they'll be a gazillion dollars under the cap after the 2009-09 season. Really, this is his finest work since he forced MJ to play baseball for 18 months as a pseudo-suspension. The man is a genius.)
LOL!
SEATTLE (AP) - Former SuperSonics owner Howard Schultz filed suit Tuesday to undo his sale of the team to an Oklahoma City-based group led by Clay Bennett, saying Bennett lied to him by insisting he planned to keep the NBA franchise in Seattle.
The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court, seeks to deprive Bennett's group of "the fruits of its deception" by rescinding the sale, and described Bennett's actions as "fraud." Schultz and his co-owners never would have sold the Sonics if they thought the new owners would move them out of town, the complaint said.
Starbucks Corp. Chairman Schultz is asking a judge to hold the team in trust until an "honest buyer" can be found who will keep the team in Seattle.
A spokesman for Bennett declined to comment Tuesday.
Bennett's Professional Basketball Club bought the team from Schultz in July 2006, and Bennett publicly insisted he planned to keep the Sonics in Seattle. On July 16 of that year, he wrote a side letter to Schultz denying any intentions to move the Sonics or the WNBA's Seattle Storm: "It is our desire to have the Sonics and Storm continue their existence in the Greater Seattle area," Bennett wrote, according to Schultz's complaint.
"That statement was false from the moment it was made," Seattle attorney Richard C. Yarmuth wrote in the complaint. "The Oklahoma City group's true intention ... was to move the team to Oklahoma City at the earliest possible time."
The complaint also disclosed the existence of an e-mail from Bennett to his co-owners two days before the sale, saying that if a new arena deal was reached to keep the Sonics in Seattle, the Professional Basketball Club could just sell the team in a "sweet flip," and still leave the ownership group "in good shape for something in OKC."
"This recently discovered e-mail makes clear that the Oklahoma City group never intended to own a team that would continue playing in Seattle," the complaint said.
The NBA's Board of Governors voted last Friday to approve the Sonics' move to Oklahoma. When asked that day about the possibility of a lawsuit by Schultz, Bennett said: "Well, I operated in good faith and that will be vetted through the trial and be clear. And further, I was disappointed because I've had a nice relationship with Howard, and I have not spoken with him about this issue, and I made a commitment to him personally, as well, that was meaningful to me and I hail to that commitment."
Bennett's group is also facing two other hurdles in its efforts to move the Sonics: a federal lawsuit brought by the city of Seattle, seeking to force the team to remain at KeyArena through the end of its lease in 2010; and a federal lawsuit brought by fans who say they were duped into buying season tickets under the premise the team would stay.
E-mails key in Schultz's suit to reverse Sonics sale
By Lester Munson
ESPN.com
Former SuperSonics owner Howard Schultz filed a lawsuit in federal court in Seattle on Tuesday, seeking to undo his sale of the franchise to a group of Oklahoma City businessmen. Schultz sold the team, he says in the suit, only after the Oklahoma group promised to keep the team in Seattle. Now, according to the suit, it is clear the Oklahoma group's statements about staying in the Northwest were "false from the moment they were made."
Schultz and his attorney, Richard Yarmuth, assert "principles of law and equity do not permit [the Oklahoma group] to continue to own the property it fraudulently obtained."
The unusual suit raises significant legal questions. Here are some of the questions and their answers:
Q: Schultz sold the team in 2006 and collected $350 million. How can he now say the sale must be unwound? Does he have any chance of success?
A: Yes, he does have some chance of success. The lawsuit relies on damning e-mails written by Clay Bennett and others in the Oklahoma group which indicate they never intended to stay in Seattle. Schultz and Yarmuth are relying on legal principles that might work. The key legal terms in the suit are "fraud," "voidable" and "constructive trust." The e-mails indicate Bennett's group was misrepresenting its intentions and could easily qualify as proof of "fraud." Two days before the sale, in a highly damaging e-mail, Bennett told one of his partners if an arena deal was eventually sealed in Seattle, they could do a "sweet flip" and just sell the team and leave Seattle.
A fraudulent sale can be "voidable," although the legal requirements are stiff. And the "constructive trust" sought by Schultz and Yarmuth is a brilliant idea that will give the judge a mechanism to take the team from Bennett and permit its sale to a Seattle-area buyer. When Bennett and his lawyers read the lawsuit, they will realize they face serious difficulty answering what Schultz and Yarmuth have put together.
Q: Schultz has been reviled in Seattle since he sold the team. Isn't this just a public relations stunt to allow Schultz to improve his public image?
A: The lawsuit is more than a public relations stunt. The allegations against Bennett and his group are serious and seem to indicate a fraud at the time of the sale. The chronology of the e-mails is compelling evidence that will allow Schultz to push Bennett and his group into a bad corner. If it were a PR stunt, both Schultz and Yarmuth would be holding press conferences and making dramatic statements. Neither would comment to ESPN.com beyond what is said in the lawsuit. The language of the suit is lean and spare. If anything, it understates the case. Their conduct and their lawsuit are clear indications they are serious about their allegations and their attempt to undo the sale.
Q: How will Bennett and his group respond?
A: They will demand a quick dismissal, hoping to bring it to an end before it becomes an obstacle to their relocation to Oklahoma City, which was approved Friday by the NBA. In motions to dismiss, they will claim American law does not permit a court to void a sale. And Bennett likely will argue his e-mails are innocent and have been misconstrued. He will also list all the efforts he made to build a new arena for the Sonics in the Seattle area. He hired an architect, he hired lobbyists and he put together a scheme for an area in suburban Renton, Wash.
His lawyers will also argue too much time has elapsed since the sale, and it is now impossible for a judge and a receiver to take control of the team and sell it to someone else. But it is unlikely Bennett will succeed in obtaining a quick dismissal. He will then argue that if the sale is indeed voided, he would deserve a significant return on his investment in the team. He will claim that it is worth much more than the $350 million that he paid for the Sonics and the WNBA's Storm in 2006. (Bennett has since sold the Storm to a group of Seattle investors for $10 million.)
Q: When will we know who wins?
A: The critical point in the lawsuit will come when Schultz asks the court for a preliminary injunction. Injunctions are the most drastic thing a civil court can do, and the requirements for an injunction are demanding. In his court papers, Schultz demands an injunction that will prevent Bennett and his group from "taking any action … that would interfere with the court's ability" to void the sale. The judge will face a difficult decision at this point in the litigation process. If Schultz persuades the judge to grant the injunction, he will be on his way to a remarkable victory, a triumph that is without precedent in the sports industry.
Q: What's in this for Schultz? Does he want to take another stab at running an NBA team?
A: Schultz insists he is not interested in money and is interested only in keeping the Sonics in Seattle. He is not asking the court to return the team to him. He wants the court to take a series of actions that will deliver the team to "an honest buyer who desires to keep the Sonics in Seattle." It is a highly unusual request for a judge. If Schultz succeeds in proving the fraudulent intentions of Bennett and his partners, the judge will be presiding over a sale, maybe even an auction, of the Sonics. It will be a complicated situation, highly unusual for a federal judge, who must evaluate possible offers and work for approval of the sale by the NBA and commissioner David Stern.
Q: How does Schultz's suit relate to the city of Seattle's lawsuit to bind Bennett to the KeyArena lease, which is scheduled to go to trial June 16?
A: Both lawsuits are in the same courthouse and could easily end up before the same judge. The lease litigation led to the discovery of the damning e-mails that are the basis for Schultz's case. The cases, added together, present Bennett with serious problems. Both jeopardize his bid to move the team to Oklahoma City. If he loses the lease case, he can still try to buy his way out of the lease by increasing his offer beyond the $26 million bid that the city rejected. If he offered $50 million or a bit more, the city would likely be obligated to give it serious consideration. Even if the city were to reach a buyout agreement with Bennett before the six-day trial begins in June, the Sonics owner will still need to deal with Schultz's suit. If Bennett loses the Schultz case, he loses the franchise.
If either suit is successful in postponing the Sonics' move beyond the start of the 2008-09 season, according to the NBA Constitution, Bennett's group will need to reapply for relocation before the NBA Board of Governors.
Lester Munson, a Chicago lawyer and journalist who reports on investigative and legal issues in the sports industry, is a senior writer for ESPN.com.
New e-mails suggest NBA concerned about breach of contract
BY ERIC D. WILLIAMS; Eric.williams@thenewstribune.com
Published: April 24th, 2008 05:32 PM
The city of Seattle released new e-mails as part of a federal court filing in New York today suggests the NBA may have suspected the Sonics’ Oklahoma City-based ownership group had violated a “good faith best effort” stipulation in its sales agreement when the group purchased the team in July 2006.
According to an e-mail last Aug. 13, Sonics chairman Clay Bennett told partner Aubrey McClendon that NBA president Joel Litvin was “looking into certain documents we signed at closing that may have been breached.”
The e-mail response was a follow-up after McClendon’s comments in a weekly Oklahoma business journal in August, in which he stated, “we didn’t buy the team to keep it in Seattle; we hoped to come here.”
McClendon was fined $250,000 by the league for his remarks.
Bennett also addressed McClendon in an e-mail on Aug. 13.
“Yes sir we get killed in this one,” Bennett says. “I don’t mind the PR ugliness (pretty used to it), but I am concerned from a legal standpoint that your statement could perhaps undermine our basic premise of ‘good faith best efforts’ when you infer that it was basically never the plan to stay in Seattle.”
The August e-mails are among several released by attorneys for the city of Seattle in an effort to convince a federal judge to approve a deposition NBA commissioner David Stern. The city also seeks financial reports and documents its believes is pertinent.
The NBA opposed Stern's deposition, stating: “The NBA has already agreed to produce Mr. Litvin, who possesses the same knowledge and has access to the same information as the commissioner on any issue about which the city’s counsel may inquire. It is therefore inappropriate to require the additional deposition of Commissioner Stern.” On Monday in New York City a hearing will be held to resolve the dispute.
This is laughable at best!!!
Monday, June 16th:
Save Our Sonics, will hold a rally, at 4:30 p.m., at the federal court building (Seventh and Stewart), the site of the trial.
Longtime all-star and one of the most familiar faces in team history, Gary Payton, who has been passionate about his belief that this team belongs in Seattle, will speak.
Xavier McDaniel, another fan favorite and an unsung hero in the fight to keep the team, will be coming from his home in Columbia, S.C., to rally the town.
Lisen to Gary
Rally At The Courthouse
Over 1,000 people showed up for the S.O.S. rally!!! Nicely done folks!! Sorry I couldn't make it from Tacoma.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/basketball/369313_trial03.html
I am very nervous....