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Bennett is the chairman of the Oklahoma City-based Professional Basketball Club LLC (PBC), which owns the NBA's Oklahoma City Thunder.Formerly known as the Seattle SuperSonics, the team was purchased from Howard Schultz in 2006 for approximately $350 million with Bennett promising a good-faith effort to keep the team in Seattle, provided there would be a public commitment to a new arena.
The team relocated to Oklahoma City and began play as the Oklahoma City Thunder in the 2008–09 basketball season, becoming the third NBA franchise to relocate in the 2000s. The Professional Basketball Club on January 8, 2008, sold the Storm to an ownership group consisting of four Seattle businesswomen. [ 6 ]
A plan for such build-out improvements began in 2007. It came in the wake of the acquisition of the Seattle SuperSonics by an Oklahoma City-based ownership group the previous October. A city ballot initiative approved by a 62 percent margin on March 4, 2008, extended a prior one-cent city sales tax for a period of 15 months in order to fund ...
Then, the city would spend $50 million contributed by the Thunder ownership, before using a minimum of $772 million expected to be financed through the sales tax beginning on April 1, 2028.
This was followed by the San Antonio Spurs purchasing the Austin Toros (now the Austin Spurs) in 2007, and the Oklahoma City Thunder purchasing the Tulsa 66ers (now the Oklahoma City Blue) in 2008. More NBA teams began to either purchase existing franchises or create expansion teams to have their own single-affiliation teams.
It takes a lot of money to own a pro sports team.
Oklahoma City Thunder guard Luguentz Dort (5), forward Jaylin Williams, left, forward Gordon Hayward and forward Jalen Williams, right end a postgame interview after an NBA basketball game between ...
[disputed – discuss] [4] On September 3, 2008, the team name, logo, and colors for the Oklahoma City franchise were revealed to the public. The name "Thunder" was chosen due to Oklahoma being a frequent victim of powerful storms due to its location in Tornado Alley, and Oklahoma City housing the 45th Infantry Division, the Thunderbirds. [5] [6]