The NBA will hold a vote later this month to weigh up adding new teams in both Las Vegas and Seattle.
According to insider Shams Charania, the NBA’s board of governors will decide if they should look into growing to 32 teams at their meetings on March 24 and 25.
If the plan eventually gets approved, both franchises are expected to start playing in the 2028-29 season.
It’s expected that bids for teams from both cities could reach as much as $10 billion and they would immediately be among the NBA’s top-eight revenue earners.
A successful vote will allow the NBA to formally focus on bringing teams to Las Vegas and Seattle, as well as host a bidding process. Another vote to finalize the deals will then be needed – with 23 of 30 governors needed to vote in favor for approval.
Expansion has been a topic for years in the NBA, and it’s no secret that Seattle – which had a team until the SuperSonics were moved to Oklahoma City in 2008 – and Las Vegas have long been clamoring for franchises.
The NBA will hold a vote this month to weigh up adding new teams in Las Vegas and Seattle
NBA commissioner Adam Silver revealed Seattle and Las Vegas were contenders in December
‘Not a secret, we’re looking at this market in Las Vegas. We are looking at Seattle,’ NBA commissioner Adam Silver said before the NBA Cup final in December.
‘We’ve looked at other markets as well. I’d say I want to be sensitive there about this notion that we’re somehow teasing these markets, because I know we’ve been talking about it for a while.
‘I think Seattle and Las Vegas are two incredible cities. Obviously we had a team in Seattle that had great success. We have a WNBA team here in Las Vegas in the Aces.
‘I don’t have any doubt that Las Vegas, despite all of the other major league teams that are here now, the other entertainment properties, that this city could support an NBA team.
‘I think now we’re in the process of working with our teams and gauging the level of interest and having a better understanding of what the economics would be on the ground for those particular teams and what a pro forma would look like for them, and then sometime in 2026 we’ll make a determination.’
