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SAN FRANCISCO – Steve Kerr was surrounded by experts on a recent visit to the Chase Center construction site, engineers and foremen alike who have spent the past year building the $1 billion arena that will open for the 2019-20 NBA season and serve as the X-factor to the Golden State Warriors’ financial future.
But in many ways, their fourth-year coach knows as much about this kind of relocation as anyone in today’s NBA. He was with Michael Jordan’s Chicago Bulls in 1994, when the move from the beloved Chicago Stadium to the cavernous United Center helped pay the basketball bills but hurt when it came to the fan experience. He was with Tim Duncan’s San Antonio Spurs in 2002, when the move from the football-centric Alamodome to the AT&T Center designed for basketball was widely seen as a success. And when the time comes for the Warriors to leave Oracle Arena after playing in Oakland for nearly five decades, he’s well aware that this arena story will have a similar subplot of its own.
“San Antonio felt like a huge victory, because the Dome was meant for football and San Antonio desperately needed a basketball arena for the Spurs,” Kerr told USA TODAY Sports. “Chicago was different, because everybody loved the old Chicago Stadium, and the United Center was so huge that it felt more like a concession to modern needs.
“I understand (that reality). They've got to pay the bills. But the old Chicago Stadium was like the old Madison Garden, one of the iconic places to play. And as a player, you kind of like that intimacy. So you know, we may face some of that in leaving Oracle. I think it's inevitable, given that when stadiums were built in the '70s, they were much more intimate because you didn't have the huge footprint with all of the suites and the causeways, the concourses and everything, to fit in all the restaurants and clubs. So you have to make a concession for the need, for generating the revenue that's going to pay for the team. But if you can do it and still figure out a way to make it a really intimate place, that's the trick. I know that's what they're trying to do here.”
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Kerr will always have a soft spot for Oracle. After all, the arena that is widely seen as one of the best in the NBA was one of the many things that attracted him to the Warriors’ job in May 2014.
“This is the one (market) that was always sort of untapped, and I could feel it when I was a player,” said Kerr, who turned down a chance to join his old Bulls coach, Phil Jackson, and the New York Knicks to take the Warriors job. “There was an electricity in the building at Oracle, even when the team was lousy. So you knew the fans loved the game. But you also looked around, and if you knew anything about the world you knew that this was like, in many ways, the center of the universe. Silicon Valley. I think when (Warriors owners) Joe (Lacob) and Peter (Guber) bought the team and made the commitment, you could feel the potential. And I think this (Chase Center) building is probably a metaphor for all of it.”
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