Last Friday, Chris Hansen, the Seattle investor who is in a binding agreement with the Maloof family to buy the Sacramento Kings raised his valuation of the team to $625 million according to his site. This is the second time he's upped his offer. The actual price that his group would pay is around $409 million.
In addition, he is offering $115 million to the NBA as a relocation fee, or nearly $4 million each to every current NBA team owner per Brian Windhorst of ESPN. The NBA owners in a relocation commitee have rejected the initial proposal to relocate the Kings, but this new valuation is making some people consider. All the owners will vote on it later this week and the relocation and finance committees will meet on this tomorrow via conference call per NBA.com's David Aldridge.
Vivek Ranadivé, who is a current minority owner of the Golden State Warriors, and who is leading a group of investors who would keep the team in Sacramento, will not up his offer and has believed that the NBA doesn't want to get into a bidding war.
The Maloof family has remained committed to selling the team to the Hansen and Steve Ballmer led group. If relocation and the sale to the Hansen and Ballmer group are officially blocked this week, the Maloofs have proposed to give a 20% share to them which probably won't sit too well with the NBA because it's obvious that they want to buy and relocate the team at some point. Either way, the Maloofs do not want to sell to Ranadivé and his group.
We'll see how this plays out. All I have to say is.... wow.