Gotta admit, I’ve been anticipating this move (though I’ll bet cagey Chris Cohan was taken by surprise):

* Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, in the wake of his America’s Cup triumph, told USA Today that he wants an NBA team, and if it’s not the Warriors, maybe he’ll buy another team and move it to San Jose.

That’s a classic flanking move, possibly right out of the BMW Oracle tri-maran (or whatever) handbook. Possibly just an aggressive feint, but can Cohan risk treating it as a such?

If Cohan won’t sell his controlling 80% stake to Ellison at Ellison’s price (reportedly offered to pay 80% of $310M franchise-value, Cohan apparently wants franchise valued at $400M), then maybe Ellison can bring another team to the area and blow away Cohan in a blink with his superior product.

Suddenly, Cohan’s Warriors wouldn’t be worth $310M, but maybe $200M, just like that, competing against the Ellison Machine.

And remember the Warriors are already losing value by the day amid their current crumbling.

Could Cohan get crushed by a stronger, more aggressive competitor after turning down buy-out offers? I believe that has happened in the business world a time or two.

Ellison noted that any such two-team concept would have to pass NBA muster, but Ellison almost certainly wouldn’t be bringing it up now unless he knew, tacitly or not, that the NBA looks kindly upon him owning a Bay Area franchise.


And I’ll repeat: I believe the commissioner would like to see Cohan become the ex-owner of Warriors ASAP. Smart guy, that David Stern. He knows a weak owner/pending disaster when he sees it.

A primer: No franchise has veto power over a move into its territorial area.
NBA teams hold 75-mile “marketing rights” for their general areas (LA/NY teams obviously share their zones).

But any team can move anywhere if it is approved by a vote of the Board of Governors, in which every owner has a vote and Stern has tremendous influence.

The last time a team moved–Seattle to Oklahoma City–the move was approved (and it didn’t involve anybody’s territorial rights) but the OKC owners had to pay a $30M re-location fee. That’s spare change for Ellison, clearly.

I don’t think the league would want two teams in the Bay Area–as much as Cohan has messed around, it’s still a great one-team market.

With the recent doomsday labor talk (and potential 2011 shutdown), the last thing Stern needs is to screw up an NBA hotbed even further than Cohan and Rowell already have screwed it up.

Two NBA teams… I dunno how the TV contracts/schedules would work, throw in the Sharks and college basketball… I just don’t know.

But if Cohan won’t budge, and if Ellison rightly refuses to pay a premium for a team that Cohan and Robert Rowell are running into the ground, then it’s possible that the NBA would let Ellison play this thing out and see where it goes.

There are several franchises that could be or already are for sale: Charlotte (though Stern would very much like that team to stay put), Detroit, Memphis and possibly Sacramento (though the Maloofs have given no indication that they want to sell, the arena issues in Sacramento aren’t going away).

The owners of HP Pavilion have always been interested in an NBA team in San Jose… but they’ve been interested largely because they want to own that team.

Hard to know how that would play out with Ellison involved, but what I’ve heard time and again when I’ve asked people about Ellison: When you have one of the 5 richest men in the world involved, nothing’s impossible.

Just look at the dang America’s Cup. Ellison lost last time, then put together a monster effort and hired the best people. And won.

I don’t know if there’s way for somebody like Chris Cohan to win this one, other than to just be stubborn and pray Ellison tosses him a few extra millions to save the trouble of a San Jose excursion.

(I still believe Ellison ideally would like a team in San Francisco, probably right by AT&T Park. Of course there’s no arena there. Yet.)

But Ellison does not have a history of throwing away free millions to those who do not bend to his will.

And it’s hard to see Chris Cohan being one of the first guys to beat Larry Ellison in a negotiation or any other endeavor.

* By the way, Larry Riley told MT-2 that the Warriors will probably stand pat at the trade deadline. Very exciting for the fan base, I’m sure.