Memphis back to Vancouver (Where the Grizzlies should be!), Charlotte to Seattle (Renamed SuperSonics of course), Sacremento to KC (Kansas City King FTW!) and New Orleans to Somewhere in Cali...Anaheim or San Jose, wherever they can thrive. Contraction is really unnecessary, there are enough Markets in NA to have 30 teams, just like the NHL can live with 30 teams, just need to be in the correct markets where people will care and show up, good owners would be nice too, I'm talking to you Mr. Ballmer, you know you want too!
Some might say Vancouver is horrible but from what I hear they want another NBA team again and a team that is run properly up there might work a bit better. Besides then you would have a real NW division with SEA, VAN and POR, with UT and DEN.
I think that KC should get a team. With the NHL's more long term financial plan and lessons learned from the lock out I think the NHL team would be a more successful and prosperous thing to attain, if you think the city can only take one more team. Seattle on the other hand, can and should be able to handle both an NBA and NHL team. Advantage of KC is they have a building. KeyArena is like so many NBA team designed buildings in that its simply not set up for full scale NHL play. the Key only hold 15,000 or so for hockey with a full house!
Seattle needs a new arena first. I think the NHL is a great to get a both NBA and NHL ready arena. Teams are a lot cheaper to purchase and run and there's no foul taste of the NHL in Seattle like there is with the NBA. Out of all the teams that seem like they should move in the NHL (Florida teams, Nashville, Atlanta, Carolina and Phoenix) I'm sure there will be more then enough teams for whatever city that wants them.
Key arena wouldn't work to well. As pissed as we are with the NBA saying it's not up to snuff for them the NHL has a point, in Hockey configuration, Keyarena only hold like 15,000 fans and the scoreboard isn't even above center ice. There's a good reason that the T-Birds left the larger key for the smaller ShoWare center. If Seattle were to get a team there would need to be major renovation to KeyArena or a new Arena built that could handle both NBA and NHL standards. Believe me, I'm from Seattle and would love to get a NHL team here (and the Supersonics back as well...) but it ain't gonna happen till there's a better venue then the Key available.
Some might say Vancouver is horrible but from what I hear they want another NBA team again and a team that is run properly up there might work a bit better. Besides then you would have a real NW division with SEA, VAN and POR, with UT and DEN.
Seattle needs a new arena first. I think the NHL is a great to get a both NBA and NHL ready arena. Teams are a lot cheaper to purchase and run and there's no foul taste of the NHL in Seattle like there is with the NBA. Out of all the teams that seem like they should move in the NHL (Florida teams, Nashville, Atlanta, Carolina and Phoenix) I'm sure there will be more then enough teams for whatever city that wants them.