The NBA’s board of governors meetings March 24-25 will vote on whether to explore adding expansion teams in Las Vegas and Seattle that would aim to start play in the 2028-29 season, sources told Shams Charania of ESPN.
Twenty-three of 30 owners must vote in favor of expansion to proceed.
If that’s approved, the league would eventually open a bidding process for the new franchises. The board of governors would later vote again on whether to finalize the transactions and expand the league from 30 to 32 teams.
The market to own an expansion team in either Las Vegas or Seattle is expected to be robust, with bids reportedly expected to come in at $7 billion-$10 billion.
In the last decade, Las Vegas has become a hub for professional sports franchises, welcoming the NHL’s expansion Golden Knights in 2017, the WNBA’s relocated Aces in 2018, and the NFL’s relocated Raiders in 2020.
Seattle has been without an NBA franchise since the SuperSonics moved and became the Oklahoma City Thunder for the 2008-09 season. The city added the Kraken, an NHL expansion franchise, in 2021. Climate Pledge Arena is the current home of the Kraken as well as the WNBA’s Seattle Storm and the PWHL’s Seattle Torrent.
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