Sam Amick

USA TODAY Sports

SACRAMENTO — Vivek Ranadive, resident owner of the Sacramento Kings and NBA lightning rod of the highest order, was surrounded by pleasantries and pageantry.

Their Golden 1 Center was finally open, this $556 million downtown Sacramento gem that he promised would be built three years ago when the team was nearly relocated to Seattle. The franchise value has skyrocketed as a result, from the initial amount of $534 million to a January estimate from Forbes of $925 million. And Ranadive, the former Golden State Warriors minority owner whose vision shaped much of the new arena’s design and who sat down recently with USA TODAY Sports, was being celebrated at every turn.

But promising as the present might be, Ranadive – the 59-year-old who founded the Silicon Valley company, Tibco Software Inc., and sold his shares for $316.4 million in Sept. 2014 – just couldn’t help but bring up the past. And who could blame him? From the time he took the role as lead owner three summers ago to the here and now, few – if any – NBA personalities have been more ridiculed.

The on-court results haven’t been pretty: a 90-156 record in the three seasons, with no playoff berths to speak of and a lack of stability along the way in the front office and coaching ranks. There has been friction between coaches, general managers, players and the like at almost every turn and constant claims of a dysfunctional culture. Last season, as rumblings of an uprising among the team’s many minority owners grew, Ranadive found himself surrounded by the negativity that has – at least for now – subsided.

To read Part One of the interview, which covers Ranadive’s early tenure that went awry and what he says he learned, click here. In Part Two, Ranadive discusses the rumblings of a possible coup from minority owners last season, the future of DeMarcus Cousins and Rudy Gay in Sacramento and the infamous night in which he brought the rap artist, Drake, into the Kings locker room just moments after Cousins had lashed out at then-coach George Karl.

Q: I wanted to ask you about the minority owner situation. Every team has that dynamic to a degree, but why do you think yours has been - from the outside looking in - more acrimonious, with more tussling than normal and the kind of stuff that bleeds into the culture of a place?

A: “So again, it's been a learning experience for me. The Warriors had a lot of minority owners, with the vice chairman, and I could have learned from (lead owner) Joe (Lacob), because he was very guarded and careful about how people got involved and what information was shared. Right from the get-go, I was very open and very inclusive. And I don't live in Sacramento, so at no other organization would you have minority owners playing golf with the coach and the rest of the staff. That's like if you're running a company, and you have your shareholders dealing with your management team telling them, 'Hey, if you don't like what's going on, just tell me and I'll fix it.’ So I don't live here, and even though I come here three or four times a week (the dynamic was difficult). And I know that people say all these things (about discontent among the minority owners), but nobody has ever said anything to me. No minority owners have ever come to me and said anything. They've all been very polite, and very nice to me.”

Q: Their frustrations aren’t hard to find, though.

A: “Well tell them that I'll write them a check. I'll write them a check today, and I've said that … Nobody has ever come to me and said anything to me. In fact, they're very happy about their investment.

“And by the way, I called up all the (minority) owners and said 'Who feels that way?' Zero (of them) put up their hand. Not even one. It was zero. And I said, 'Hey, if some of you are unhappy, then I'll write you a check.' ... So look, every time somebody calls and wants a favor, and (team president) Chris (Granger) or (chief operating officer) Matina (Kolokotronis) have to say no, then they feel like they should get this or they should get that or they should have a role in this, then they might become unhappy. And I think what other organizations have done is they've kept it very close to start with. You know, I get texts from new owners, and they say, 'Hey, so and so wants to be in the war room on draft day. What's your advice and how do you do it?' And what I do now is different from what we did three years ago, OK?

“And now it's more what I learned from Joe. Look, this is something where it's more like politics than it is like business, and everything is debated in the press and you guys play a role, but at the end of the day I'm still trying to understand what these so-called complaints were.”

Q: From the minority owners?

A: “Yeah, tell me.”

Vivek Ranadive's early years with Kings forgettable

Q: Well, painting a picture of a non-inclusive environment in which a lot of your employees are afraid that if they say the wrong thing they're going to be sent packing, where the power runs through one person and one person only.

A: “I don't know who's saying that, but I have a long track record. I built a multi-billion dollar company, and the people who work for me work for me for 25 years and they're still loyal to me 25 years later even though they don't work for me. We've created a great organization … (and) look, we got an arena built in record time. We've almost doubled our revenues since I bought the franchise. We built this arena, where a lot of people have found that it's not that easy to do ... Look, I have never had anyone come and say any of these things to me, so in a way I rest my case.”

Q: On the basketball front, what's your perspective and strategy when it comes to DeMarcus. He obviously has this season and next on his deal, and a lot of people wonder if you guys would consider trading him this season.

A: “Well again, I leave it up to (general manager) Vlade (Divac). What I see is a young guy who wants to win, and has actually matured. And I'm just repeating what I hear Vlade saying, so it's better to ask him this question, but I think what Vlade really wants to see is - and the way he says it with his Serb accent - is hugs (laughs). Hugs. He wants to see hugs, and he wants to see growth as a teammate. I know that Vlade and coach (first-year coach Dave Joerger, formerly of the Memphis Grizzlies) will make the right decisions, and I don't know. Right now what I see is I'm excited for what we have.”

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Q: To this point, the strong sense has been that you've always been a big fan of his and he's not going anywhere because Vivek doesn't want him to go anywhere.

A: “I think, look, when I first bought the team I had to make one decision, which was 'Do I give him a contract (extension) or not (in Sept. 2013)?' and I made the decision to give it to him. I feel like that was the right decision. But other than that, I haven't really made any basketball decisions, because after that I hired a GM and a coach and everyone else. But I expect that Vlade will make the right calls. I think DeMarcus truly looks up to Vlade. I think he truly likes the coach.”

Q: But is he still the guy you're building around or are you just seeing how things unfold?

A: “You should ask Vlade that question. As a fan, I think he's great. But I think Vlade is the guy (to answer that).”

Q: On the Rudy front, it's out there now that he let you guys know he won't be re-signing here next summer and obviously he'd be more than happy to get a new start somewhere else. Your reaction to that?

A: “Again, I was puzzled to read that I was involved in that (situation) because I had zero involvement in it. Rudy and his agent wanted me to be there when they expressed that they weren't happy, and I didn't really want to be (there). It meant flying out here (from the San Francisco Bay Area) and meeting (at Sleep Train Arena), and so then finally they said, 'Hey, just out of respect for him would you do it?' and I said 'Sure.' But again, whatever Vlade wants to do Vlade will do.”

Q: Was it a trade request or did he simply say he wouldn't be re-signing next summer? How would you characterize that conversation?

A: “He obviously - there is some unhappiness. And Vlade said, 'Hey look, we want to do what's right for the team and we're going to do what's right for the team.' But he's a great guy. He's a professional. It's his last year, and I'm sure he's going to go out there and do his best and we'll see. But I have confidence that Vlade and him and everyone else will work it out.”

Before parting ways, Ranadive wanted to discuss the night that Drake’s presence in the Kings’ locker room after a loss left many questioning his judgment…

A: “He's friends with DeMarcus. And by the way, I've never ever been into the locker room (after a game). So when he was on his way, he said, 'Hey, I'm just going to go say hi to DeMarcus.' He had come all the way to support him, and I didn't know that (there had been a fight).”

Q: Well since you brought it up, here's something I'd heard for a while: isn't this is a business arrangement between you and some of the artists who come in?

A: “No, what kind of business agreement?

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Q: So Drake's not getting paid to come to the game, or getting a private jet to come out on your dime?

A: No, no, no. Not at all.

Q: He's coming out because of the relationship with DeMarcus?

A: Yeah, and also he was intrigued. He had heard about me through my son, and he was intrigued with what we were doing with the new arena. And quite honestly, he did give us some good ideas about it. So one of the things that I didn't talk about today was that - you know, I talked about removing the friction, and so we also want to make this a place that the top performing artists say that 'Hey, I want to go to Golden 1..'

Q: But on that night, you didn't know there was a problem in the locker room?

A: “Here's the thing, OK? I'm a huge fan of basketball, and I would like nothing better than to just sit there and watch the game. That's like my No. 1 choice. But I also know that I represent the brand and they're trying to make this a place that people come (to). They're trying to make this like LA or like Oakland now has become, where it's a who's-who of people coming. So they have people come, and then I'm expected to sit with them and chat with them.

“(Drake) loves Boogie. He loves Kentucky. He loves Coach (John) Calipari. And I had no - I just do what they tell me to do. And so they say, 'Hey sit here with Drake, or sit here with Jamie Foxx or sit here with this person.’ For me, I would rather just sit there. It's work for me. When that happens, I'm working. I'm entertaining them, talking to them.”

Q: That night, though, did you sense pretty quickly that there was some serious tension in the room?

A: You know, look, George had tried to trade Cousins that whole summer, and there was not a lot of love between those two, and so there was tension there. So that was not a new thing.”