srkboy:

Serious question here (or for anyone else who can answer):

What portions, if any, of the sales contract between the Bennett group and Schultz specified the terms of what constituted "good faith efforts"?

If Schultz had been truly so worried about keeping the Sonics in Seattle, identifying the acts of specific performance necessary to meet a contractual demand of "good faith acts" could easily have been enumerated, and ownership retained in full by Schultz had they not been met.

It isn't magic; you incorporate language to the effect of the original owner retaining 51% of the team upon initation of the agreement, and then a transfer of the remaining 49% to Bennett upon completion of items x, y, and z within so-many days certain that demonstrated whatever measure of "good faith" he wanted. But I don't think he did that - again, if he did, I'd love to see it. "Trying to create a winner" or "trying to make the team successful" isn't legal performance language - heck, I could argue that not "folding" the team is "trying" to make it succesful. It needs to be in writing - somehow - and to me that's why all this retrospective righteous indignation from Schultz sounds so terribly disingenuous.

Again, if there was language about good faith efforts in that sales contract, I'd love to see it, and have a lawyer read it to see if I'm anywhere near in the right ballpark. Contrary to that, I think all this legal nonsense is talk from a former owner who realized too late that the people pursuing his (former) franchise were serious - and now that the NBA has made the move "official," there's a great deal of hindsight CYA'ing going on...and Schultz won't mind spending a few million of his own fortune if it buys him even a bit of posterior-coverage in the public eye.

-sd