Seattleites have never gotten over the loss of their NBA team back in 2008. After waiting for 16 years, we now have the official date of the Seattle Supersonics’ return!
Read on for all the details.
We have good and bad news for you. The bad news is that today is April Fools’ Day. We’re admitting our tomfoolery right off the bat, partly because last year’s April Fools post about the Fremont Troll had Seattleites in an uproar. Also, there have been recent updates about the Sonics that we can share—so keep reading!
The good news is that according to the NBA, it actually is very likely that the SuperSonics will be returning to Seattle sooner rather than later. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver spoke about the league expanding over summer 2023, saying that it’s a possibility they want to explore once the current media rights deal expires in 2025. He specifically mentioned Seattle, saying: “There’s no doubt there’s enormous interest in Seattle. That’s not a secret.”
It’s not a sure thing yet and there’s no timeline being publicly shared, but it seems very likely that Seattle will get our NBA team back within the next few years. It helps that the recently-renovated Climate Pledge Arena is ready and waiting to provide the Sonics with an appropriate home. (A dispute over a new arena is what kicked off the sale of the Sonics to Oklahoma City in the first place back in 2008.) The arena even has a “future NBA locker room” put aside for them.
Best of all, when our team returns we’ll still be able to call them the SuperSonics since the city of Seattle retained the rights to the name. So don’t give up hope, Seattleites. It’s happening—just not today. (Sorry!)