The Trail Blazers are “very far apart” in their negotiations with the city of Portland to provide public funding for renovations to the Moda Center, a team source tells Jason Quick of The Athletic.
City officials sent the Blazers a term sheet on Friday outlining a 20-year lease agreement that includes $600MM in public funds to upgrade the arena. Quick notes that Portland is asking the team to pay $3MM per year for a property tax offset, which would increase over time. The proposal also requires the team to hire union workers and set caps on cost overruns.
“The term sheet is a non-starter,’’ Quick’s source said. “I don’t know why they sent it to us, because they know very little of the stuff we would agree to. They are playing politics at this point.”
The team’s board of directors will meet later today to discuss the offer and prepare a response. The city has scheduled a vote on funding for August 12, and Quick notes that a deal must be reached by the end of the year for the offer to include state funds.
There are fears that failure to reach an agreement could result in the Trail Blazers leaving Portland when their lease at the arena expires in 2030. There’s “unspoken tension” that new owner Tom Dundon would consider relocating the team, but Quick hears from two high-ranking sources in the organization that Dundon has never mentioned that as a possibility.
“No one with the Blazers has ever said we want to move,’’ one of the sources said. “We don’t want that. We want to stay in Portland.’’
Quick points out that the relationship between the Blazers and city officials has become strained, with both sides accusing each other of operating in bad faith. Some council members believe the team hasn’t been open about how it plans to spend the money from the city.
“I think the Blazers have been behaving poorly,’’ councilor Mitch Green said. “They thought because they passed the state legislature (for $365MM in funding) that the deal was done. But we have a set of councilors who are asking tough questions. And this is Portland, Oregon, where people want more public transparency than there has been.’’
The Blazers contend they haven’t shared their renovation plans because they’re currently just “ideas or concepts,” and they’re upset that councilor Steve Novick threatened to sue the team last month for failing to properly maintain the Moda Center.
“We don’t even want to respond to the term sheet until they remove that gun to our head,’’ a team source told The Athletic.
Another Trail Blazers source told Quick that they’re reluctant to go into detail with council about their renovation ideas until they’re sure that the information won’t become part of a lawsuit.
According to Quick, the Blazers’ plans include a new atrium entrance on the north side of the arena that would provide for easier traffic flow. They also want to place kitchens on all three levels to provide more concession options, eliminate some seating and create a bar area, and update the club-level seats.
Quick notes that team officials thought a deal with the city was secure after the state made a $365MM commitment in March to renovate the arena. However, that arrangement is contingent on the city of Portland agreeing to provide $120MM, plus another $88MM from Multnomah County. The Blazers contend that a “handshake agreement” with all three entities took place and they don’t understand why things have changed.
Quick also hears that team officials have been examining recent arena deals in Oklahoma City and Utah as they explore their options, which may include trying to get a new facility in Portland.
“The city’s delay has given us time to study what a market deal is,’’ Quick’s source said. “And let’s just say the $600MM deal that was supposed to be done six months ago was a way-below-market deal.’’
The team we wanted to move was the Pelicans not the Blazers
Why would the Pelicans move?
they are near the bottom of the league in franchise value, revenue, earnings before tax and attendance. The owner cares more about the Saints than the Pelicans. Oh, and they hired Joe Dumars to fix things, lol.
Ok fair points lol
Pelicans fans have seen basically no success
They haven’t had true on court hope since Boogie’s injury
Boogie going down with that injury really sucked. As a hoops fan I was severely disappointed. They could have been a problem!
thoughts and prayers to the rich owners. The struggle is real.
lmao
oh no not Tom Dundon and his $2.3B net worth!! he is so smol bean!! noo
One small correction, the term sheet was only an unapproved draft that the council cc’d the Blazers on. It wasn’t “sent”, as far as being an approved formal document.
Disgusting. Step up, Silver.
This is probably what Silver (and the rest of the owners) want. They want Portland moved to a more lucrative city.
Yeah, they want a city they can extract more tax funds from. Sad state of things
@rct
I kind of doubt that – there were a lot of hurt feelings when Bennett (with Stern’s help) stole the Sonics. I’m pretty sure Silver doesn’t want to have zero teams in the Pacific NW.
Silver can solve that by moving Portland elsewhere and putting an expansion team in Seattle. If the PNW is going to have a team, Silver would rather it be in Seattle.
That’s not as easy as it sounds – what cities would realistically be a viable alternative for Dundon to move the blazers to?
I don’t know because I am not Dundon. But if you think it isn’t easy to pull off, I refer you to the Sonics, Grizzlies, and Hornets/Pelicans in recent times. Or the myriad other examples in NBA history (Kings, Warriors, Wizards, Clippers, Lakers, 76ers, Pistons, Rockets, Hawks, Nets, and Jazz). About half of the league played somewhere else at one point. No different in the NBA, NHL, and MLB.
All I know is, if the right wheels are greased and the right location is chosen, anything can happen and usually not above board. Look at the Athletics in baseball.
Why am I not surprised? Carolina Trailblazers anyone?
Charlotte hornets would do everything in their power to keep the Carolina’s to themselves
Raleigh proved that this is an NHL city. Can we be an NBA city as well?
San Jose, CA can also say this. Also a huge MLS city. Also lowkey the 49ers play there now. Also a top 10 USA city in terms of money+people. I would prefer they get an expansion team though.
You really want to give these guys your tax payer funds? Studies show the economic benefits are outweighed by public costs but I hope you guys get that basketball team you want to spend your taxes on
Who paid for and conducted these studies that you are referring to?
Not with that dump of a facility
I love sports, but we figured out long ago that the economic impact of these arenas does not usually generate enough tax dollars to pay back the public dollars. Now communities may still want to pay for reasons other than dollars and cents. If it was my local government I would want them to play a little hard ball.
Except for you’re wrong and the fact that the Moda center is owned by the city of Portland. So why would a owner pay for any type of upgrades to an arena that he doesn’t own that the city owns. So they pay rent so it’s on the city to renovate and upgrade the stadia.
This is what happens when you guys talk about things you don’t know and are not speaking on an economical standpoint. You wouldn’t own a business pay rent somewhere and then spend your own money to upgrade a building that you don’t own. That makes zero sense as a owner or not financially responsible. On top of that Your team, the trainers. Everybody who works for the team brings in revenue to the state and to the city. People go downtown to watch games, the local bars, all the jobs it creates. If you knew anything about Portland you would know they waste so much money on other things renovating the stadium. Is this just them being hard-headed?
Again, it’s the blazers that want upgrades. And acting like an NBA franchise is like any other business as far as who pays for upgrades is nonsense.
Commercial leases can be written all kinds of different ways. Commercial tenants make improvements to properties all time. It depends on the terms of the lease. It is a negotiation. The owner is trying to big boy the city in the press. Why shouldn’t the city swing back?
Why would you when another city will. We gotta stop acting like it’s not a business. At the end of the day. The tent (blazers) are making the city money. All the jokes tax, trainers coaches games, bars merchandise. The City wins. Blazers leave it’s over for downtown Portland. Again a bunch of people talking who don’t live here. Spend millions and millions on homeless a camps. Making drugs legal. So many social programs but the taxes paying for all that you don’t want o up grade the stadium. Moda center is one of the worse outdated stadium in the league. I would just leave if I was the owner. Don’t want to invest in the team why invest in the city. Seattle learned there lesson and would welcome a team with open arms and pay
@Buying buckets
This is sports, not politics. It’s shows why these owners pull relocations like this. Political grifting, and you’re a good mouthpiece for their strategy.
So you don’t want the city to negotiate the best deal they can with your tax dollars?
Dundon may have never says he wanted to move the team. Imo that was always his plan. He made a career of subprime auto loans. He if definitely not the most ethical person. Jodi messed up by not selling to Uncle Phil at the time. She could have sold 51%. Then the new TV deal would have bunnies up the value which she was banking on.
Dame needs to immediately retire and be the majority owner. He has enough money to make it happen
The billionaire class needs to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.
This situation is up to Adam Silver, will he prioritize history or money
I hope he does the right thing and pressure Dundon to make things work in Portland, they are absolutely a basketball town and there is a reason why they have been there for 50+ years
Then renovate the stadium. This city owns the Moda center so I don’t understand what you guys are talking about. It’s their responsibility to renovate the stadium. The team would make more money in Seattle a bigger Market. Oregon isn’t doing well nor is Portland and they need to pony up in renovate the stadia. Now the owner owned the stadium and yes, but when the city owns the stadium and the blazers are paying rent, it’s your responsibility to fix it just like if you own rental properties
Trail Blazers owner and paid spokesperson are morons. Do they think the tax payers are really going to approve giving money to a multi
Billionaire cheapskate ahole? They should be happy they were even offered anything. Clown show running this team. Portland should say see ya, go rip off some idiots in another state.
No one is asking the taxpayers. This is 100% on the Portland Mayor and city council.
If you look into this beyond “Billionaire cheapskate ahole bad”, you would learn that this SAVES the city money compared to just doing the maintenance for 20 years with no NBA team and no upgrades.
Sounds like normal negotiations. The owner’s personal wealth has nothing to do what the respective parties (city and team) “should” pay for. A rich owner should facilitiate things by backstopping the team’s obligations, but he’d be an idiot to increase those obligations to include things that he believes should be the city’s obligations simply because he’s rich. If he wants to make a charitable donation, there are more worthy causes than the city.
Unfortunately, the idiot city counselor threatening a lawsuit at this stage isn’t really normal.
One hopes that the politicians will stop making decisions that will end up being worse for the city financially if they force the Blazers to move.
No, its not normal, although its becoming less and less notable. The rising theme in city governments is their collective lack of business acumen, and it makes it difficult for them to successfully interact with the business community.
Politics, accounting, back stabbing, false narratives and fairy tales = NBA 2026.
1. Officials from the city of Portland need to give them an uppercut. What other sports team you got?
2. Adam Silver is ruthless when it comes to money. Does not care about the fans, the actual game.
Is there an nba world without blazers and sonics? That’s disgraceful. How’s the European takeover going. Lols. I remember when the actual game was the product.
Haha okay kill the tax revenue for the Blazers and see how Portland will do. Again you don’t live here so your talking out your butt
People like you can never separate sports from politics huh?