Fearing the Trail Blazers Moving is an Unhelpful Response

Ever since news broke in May that the Portland Trail Blazers were being put up for sale, one primary fear has dogged the franchise fan base: Will the team be moved as part of the transaction? Memories of the neighboring Seattle SuperSonics—sold in 2006, moved to Oklahoma City and rebranded the Thunder in 2008—are fresh in the minds of Portlanders. They don’t want a repeat 90 miles to the south.

The sales process appears to be moving methodically, with no hard news coming forth since the initial announcement. That doesn’t stop speculation, though. Every few weeks a new cycle of worries comes up, complete with fans and media rehashing the possibilities and demands inherent in a sale.

Yesterday we got four questions on this matter in the Blazer’s Edge Mailbag, including this one.

Dave,

What can we do to make sure the team stays put when it’s sold? I’m nervous and sometimes even scared. I’ve supporting this team for my whole life. I was literally a kid when I started. The thought of them moving breaks my heart. I’m ok with changing owners but I want to be sure we don’t lose them.

Nick

First off, let me say that I hear you and empathize. I understand that feeling. Nothing I’m going to say here is meant to minimize it. This is one of the costs of ownership transfers. Fans get to feel insecure until the process is resolved. I’m sorry you have to go through this.

Nobody can guarantee that the Blazers won’t move. Technically that would be true even if the Allen Foundation remained as owners. Getting a new group up top doesn’t create the issue. It introduces more uncertainty into an already-volatile situation. It’s the difference between knowing Mt. Tabor is actually a volcano and seeing a crack open near the reservoir. You don’t know what’s going to happen, but the reminder isn’t pleasant, especially if you own property in Southeast Portland.

We do know this, though. Decisions about the Blazers staying or moving will likely revolve around a narrow subset of factors. Few of those are in the control of people like you and me. None of them respond to fear.

In my other job, I walk with people through lots of major transitions: job changes, relationship unions and break-ups, life-changing medical diagnoses and the like. Here’s what I’ve generally found.

When you face a huge transition, you’ll usually interact with experts tasked with explaining, addressing, and giving you information about the journey. If you get a serious medical diagnosis, for instance, doctors and other medical staff will sit with you, explain the possible outcomes, give you statistics on which are more probable, and offer alternatives and suggestions. Those experts have knowledge and experience. They convey them to you. They’ll be quite frank with you about what lies ahead. That’s their job, one of the benefits of having been trained in this and having seen it hundreds of times before.

The one thing they won’t do—no matter how grave or serious the diagnosis—is make you feel fear. They want the opposite, in fact. Whether the road goes up or down, they want you to be able to walk it with awareness, intentionality, dignity, and the ability to make the best decisions possible for you and your loved ones. That is true even though neither their decisions or yours can control the eventual outcome for sure.

Plenty of people will make you feel fear under those circumstances, though. Not the natural fears and concerns that everybody experiences—not the fear of wondering about yourself or the fears of loved ones for you—but extra fears…fear of being out of control, fear of suffering and loss, the kind of fear that says this shouldn’t be happening in the first place. Those people are the hucksters, the solution-peddlers. They create and enhance fear, then get you to ride it for their own benefit. “Buy my book. Buy my treatment. Buy my miracle straight from the hands of my deity.”

To be clear, I am not disparaging people who seek extra help under those circumstances, nor trying to discourage them from getting that help wherever they find the most comfort. I am drawing a bright line on the supply side between people who are actually experts in a field and people who are pretending to be in order to convince you of something and/or sell you something. The experts will usually talk about specific, narrow issues that actually affect the process in ways that help empower your journey amid the fear. Self-interested non-experts will usually talk about all the other issues involved in ways that exacerbate your fear then follow through by trying to sell you something to calm it.

This lesson holds, at least loosely, to the matter at hand for us. The Blazers are for sale. We don’t know the intentions of the new owner yet, in part because there is no new owner yet. We can’t control the outcome. It’s scary.

That said, from the start, the people who are relatively expert in the field have shared at least a couple pieces of information with us. One is that they’d prefer to keep the team in Portland. The sincerity and utility of that may vary, as that’s exactly what they’re expected to say. The second, even more specific, is that arena renovation or replacement will be critical to the process. That message has been consistent, sound, and wholly predictable. Once again I’ll point out that the very day after the sale announcement, we put this on the table for all to see:

It’s likely that the Moda Center itself will stand at the eye of the storm. The arena is old. The lease agreement included renovation possibilities. Will that be enough for ownership or will they want a new facility entirely? If renovations are on the table, who will pay for them?

When NBA Commissioner Adam Silver addressed the issue, we followed up:

Two things can be true at once. The NBA and the Allen Foundation can have a strong preference for keeping the Blazers in place while at the same time evidencing a strong bias, or even demand, towards replacing the Moda Center. The arena has been a long-time, contentious sticking point between the Blazers and Portland. This is exactly when, and how, it comes to a head.

The issue hasn’t changed. It won’t change. This is the hinge on which this sale is going to pivot in the public arena.

In the midst of this, lots of people will introduce other subjects. Fans will cite history and how much they love the team. Other people will rally on other points, legalities or emotions or just grabbing attention. It all amounts to expressing or stirring fear. Some of it may even be used to motivate you to act in some way towards the benefit of the people doing the stirring.

In the meantime, the central issue will remain the deciding one. No matter how much we love the team, love doesn’t build lucrative luxury suites. No matter how much history the franchise has had over five decades, that doesn’t guarantee tomorrow’s revenue. No matter how many ancillary petitions are signed or rallies are called, if they don’t have to do with a new arena directly, they’re just decoration.

Will the city of Portland (or whatever other municipalities and governing bodies) stand behind a new or majorly-renovated arena for the Blazers? How much are they—and you, through your government—willing to subsidize the effort? Those are the two major details that matter.

Anybody trying to invoke anything else is either a non-expert, trying to sell you something, or both. You’re more than free to pay attention, follow, or contribute, especially if that gives you a sense of direction or allays your fear. Just be aware that it’s probably not going to make as much tangible difference as you think in the long run.

Unless Portland gets a sweetheart owner already connected with the community, with enough resources not to need controlling outside investors, the people who make these decisions will judge down the narrow field of view we’ve just laid out. Asking yourself and your governing bodies serious questions about a new arena is almost certainly the best way to affect the outcome you’re worried about. Until we hear different, everything else is just optics or distraction.