Professional basketball may be coming back to the Pacific Northwest - in particular, Seattle - but it will likely come at the expense of the Kings in California's capital. According to reports today the Maloof brothers have agreed to sell the franchise to a group that hopes to move the franchise back to Seattle for the 2013-14 NBA season. The Maloofs price tag for the Kings is a reported $500 million.

Adrian Wojnarowski with the story:

The deal will sell the Kings for approximately $500 million to a group led by hedge-fund manager Chris Hansen and Microsoft chairman Steve Ballmer. The group is seeking to relocate the franchise to Seattle's KeyArena for the 2013-14 season.

The Seattle group's plans, with support of the NBA, is to play two seasons in KeyArena before moving into a new Seattle arena, sources said.

No agreement has been signed, but one source with knowledge of the talks described the deal as "first and goal at the 1." The Maloofs' history of changing course late in negotiations still has some uneasy about getting the sale completed. The Maloofs previously neared a deal with Sacramento leaders to help finance a new arena in the city before backing out.

The Maloofs are expected to keep an extremely small percentage of the team, but will have no real input or say in the franchise, sources said.