The NBA Champion Oklahoma City Thunder Unveiled The First Renderings For Their New Arena And It Looks AWESOME

NBA Photos. Getty Images.

At the moment, life is pretty sweet for the reigning NBA Champs. For starters, they just won their first ever franchise title (1979 Sonic do not count), then they immediately locked up their championship core of SGA/JDub/Chet with max extensions, then Summer League started and their next wave of talent started showing promising signs for the future. From October to today, it's been nothing but living on Cloud 9 for that franchise and fanbase.

The good news for them (and bad news for everyone else), is that things just got even better. The Thunder released our first look at their new arena which is slated to be ready come 2028, and it looks pretty fucking sick

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Not bad for $900M! I'm not sure if it will rival what Steve Ballmer and the Clippers did with their new arena by installing no fewer than 10,000 toilets, but you're lying to yourself if you don't think that looks sick as hell. Granted, I'm also a sucker for any good new stadium/arena rendering regardless of the sport, but my eyes don't lie. Especially you consider what they're coming from.

The Paycom Center first opened in 2002 and was basically built to the bare minimum of NBA and NHL standards. The Thunder moved in after arriving from Seattle in 2008, and 17 years later is easily one of the best home crowds/advantages in the entire league. But in terms of being a state of the art arena, it wasn't quite up to current standards. 

Getting a brand spanking new $900M arena is big news by itself, but you then have to remember what this now means moving forward when talking about this current team's title window. It's no secret the Thunder backed up the Brinks truck to keep their championship core together (as they should), and that before they know i,t their roster is going to be expensive as hell. That will matter for two reasons

1. Luxury tax/repeater tax penalties

2. 2nd apron roster penalties

So why should this arena excite Thunder fans? For starters, let's tackle the luxury tax part. They are in a rare position where they haven't been paying the tax at all these last handful of years. That's allowed them to essentially "bank" a fuck ton of money for when the times come that they do start to pay the tax. Taking a look at their books, that's currently slated to start in 2026-27

Essentially, you get 3 years of being a tax team before the repeater tax penalties start to hit, which is where things get VERY VERY expensive. This is where the timing of this new arena helps. Not only do the Thunder have the reserve built up from not paying the tax all these years, but they're also going to be able to add all this new revenue from the arena as well. That's why being a contender where the owner also owns their own building is important. It helps ease the pain of writing those massive tax bill checks because you're flush with cash.

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There's also the potential that things look different by the time we get to the years where either side can opt out of the CBA (2029-30), but this is where the 2nd apron angle will also come into play.

For that, you basically get 2 years of being a 2nd apron team. Between the repeater tax penalties AND the roster building penalties, you need a shit ton of cash AND avenues to get under the 2nd apron while still being competitive. A new arena and all the money that comes with it is something that will also help navigate those 2nd apron repeater tax issues. My guess is OKC finds a way to push out the start of their 2nd apron clock from 2026-27 to 2027-28, whether that's unloading iHart & Co or turning down their player option and then re-signing them at a lower number. That would help align the 2nd apron clock and the repeater tax clock to both hit after this arena is up and running. 

So if you are a competing team that hopes to take down the Thunder and thought they were only in a great spot because of their cheap contracts and draft picks, I'm sorry to tell you this. As long as ownership is willing to spend, they won't have to touch this championship core. Sure, some of the pieces around them might change, but that's what the picks are for. When it comes to affording this core and still building a contending roster around them, you need an ownership group that is willing and able to pay for it, penalties be damned. Given the Thunder's window is wide open, there's no reason not to spend if we're being honest, and part of me feels like OKC has learned from their previous mistakes in this regard. 

This is all why many people who are smarter than all of us continue to stress that no team in the NBA has ever been in this type of unique position as they navigate this new CBA world. The combination of age, picks, tax money reserve and a new arena/TV deal income stream is unlike any other team at the moment. It doesn't guarantee future titles are on the horizon because nothing in the NBA is ever guaranteed regardless of how good things may look right now, but there's no denying OKC is about as well-positioned as humanly possible in their pursuit of making that dream a reality.