NBA commissioner Adam Silver expects the topic of league expansion to be addressed at the NBA’s board of governors meeting in Las Vegas next month, with the expectation for the topic to be explored formally, per ESPN.
Silver mentioned that his goal is to “take the temperature of the room” regarding expansion.
“There’s been no lack of interest,” Silver said. “I essentially have said to people from several different cities, ‘We’re just not engaging in that process right now.’ I want to be fair to everyone. So I don’t want to have meetings with some and not others.
“So if we were to say yes, we’re now going to move into a more formal exploratory phase. We would take those meetings, and in addition likely we would engage with outside advisers who would look at markets, look at economic opportunities and media opportunities, etc.”
However, Silver also said that the league’s expansion is far from a given.
“I’d say the current sense is we should be exploring it,” he said. “I don’t think it’s automatic, because it depends on your perspective on the future of the league.
“As I’ve said before, expansion in a way is selling equity in the league. If you believe in the league, you don’t necessarily want to add partners. On the other hand, we recognize there are underserved markets in the United States and elsewhere — I think markets that deserve to have NBA teams. Probably even if we were to expand, more than we can serve.”
It’ll be especially interesting to see if an NBA team returns to Seattle.
