Kevin Johnson was a tenacious player who could make the impossible look spectacular in his NBA career.

If he can get a brand new arena into the heart of downtown Sacramento, KJ will have accomplished the most impossible feat of his professional life. At this point, the idea of getting any new arena into the greater Sacramento area seems a bit far-fetched. After a complicated 3-way land swap proposal got shot down because it wasn’t really even feasible for a game of Monopoly, the city of Sacramento and the Kings organization are back at square one.

How do you get a new arena into Sacramento when the funds just aren’t really there?

According to The Sacramento Bee, Mayor Kevin Johnson is asking for more arena proposals from developers. He’s asking for developers to bring in brand new ideas or to bring in the same ideas from before with the necessary tweaks to make it a viable option for the city to consider. If the developers can’t bring anything into the fold that makes any sense, the city is left with the very realistic risk that the Maloofs could up and move the Kings to a city that is willing to give the franchise a brand new arena to call their own.

Cities like Kansas City, Seattle and even Louisville are attempting to get in position to pounce on any available NBA team if the owners and the NBA decide it’s time for a change of scenery. To counteract this potential loss, groups like Here We Stay are forming up and trying to raise awareness of just how badly California’s capitol needs to build an arena and retain the only professional sports franchise the immediate area has.

Since the land swap deal failed and the NBA decided to pull out its support and efforts of getting a new arena in Sacramento, it’s left the city and the Maloofs at a standoff. The Maloofs appear to be committed to keeping this team in Sacramento, but realistically they can only conduct business from the current relic of Arco Arena for so long. On the other side, many of those wanting a new arena to keep the team in town also don’t want to have to front the bill for it.

A comment left on the Sacramento Bee article perfectly sums up where the two sides aren’t able to truly compromise:

"1.) No public tax monies should be used to build a new basketball arena. 2.) No fooling the public as to the use of tax dollars by having the subsidies funneled in the form of land give-aways, permit fee waivers and/or tax waivers to participating developers. 3.) Rather than giving the revenues from basketball arena parking and stadium naming rights, the city should keep those revenues and use them to avoid further layoffs of police officers and firefighters. 4.) This is all about the egos of the billionaires from Las Vegas being able to have upscale corporate boxes for the wealthy elite. No one will subsidize construction for the hard-working middle class. 5.) Make the Kings repay their outstanding loan balance to Sacramento prior to giving them even a single penny more than the millions that they still owe from past Sacramento loans."

As times get desperate in resolving this situation, the public will wonder why they have to pay for an arena with public funds and taxes when the Maloofs are far richer than any individual having to vote on approving a new venue. People are going to view this as the rich Maloofs trying to get richer without building their own home on their own dime. It’s like an episode of Extreme Makeover, except everyone in the town is mad that the tenants of the dilapidated residence might want this new home for free.

For the Maloofs, they really don’t have to build their own arena with their own money. Lots of cities and franchises have accomplished what the Maloofs are sort of asking for because they wanted to keep their pro team. Even though the Maloofs were willing to put up $300 million of their own money toward the land swap proposal (while reaping the benefits of some savvy business sense by keeping parking revenue), it’s still viewed as not enough by the patrons of a city drowning in a horrible economy.

Everybody looks to Seattle as the example of how this problem can turn out if an arena deal doesn’t get done, but that’s not the way it should be compared. Seattle has two major pro teams to fall back on after the loss of the Sonics. Sacramento would have a Triple-A baseball team and some secondary “pro” football team that’s highlights include Daunte Culpepper, Denzel Washington’s son and tailgating at the local commuter university parking lot.

The city of Sacramento really doesn’t seem to understand that losing the Kings would be losing a lot of their identity. While the Here We Stay crew and arena supporters seem to get it, it also doesn’t mean that everyone should just give in to some half-baked arena deal in order to keep its pro sports identity. It’s just a tough situation for everybody involved.

The arena is bad. The economy is bad. The proposals are bad.

Now it’s up to Kevin Johnson to do the spectacularly impossible once again.