When the San Francisco Giants announced their plan to revitalize Mission Bay with a $1.6 billion, 27-acre development project last week, one piece that was notably missing from the plan was a long-rumored basketball arena that would bring the Golden State Warriors back to the city. Today, thanks to some sleuthing from the Chronicle's Matier & Ross, we learn the the Warriors broke away from that opportunity because they are looking to make a play of their own a little farther up the waterfront at Pier 30.

According to M&R's sources familiar with the team's plans to relocate to San Francisco, the Warrior's ownership group is "pretty bold and visionary". Meaning: they'd rather do something big on their own than hitch themselves to Larry Baer's Mission Rock development wagon.

There's also the fact that Pier 30 recently became available, now that Larry Ellison's America's Cup team dropped it from their development deal. Although the pier won't be cleaned up for the upcoming regatta, the city has agreed to sink $8 million in to rehabbing the pier which is currently not much more than a parking lot and a patio for Red's Java House. According to Matier and Ross, the pier will still need another $50 million worth of work before the Warriors can even begin to think about building a 20,000-seat arena on top of it — which is giving some real estate experts pause. (And the high cost of development was what turned off the A-Cup to begin with.)

Still, now that the Niners will officially be a South Bay team in a couple years and the Giants continue to be the city's sporting darlings*, a new waterfront arena snuggled up under the Bay Bridge could do wonders to lure the Warrior's East Bay fans to the city without letting the NBA team get outshined by the orange and black. For their part, the Giants don't seem too miffed: Larry Baer told the Chronicle last week that they're ready to move forward in Mission Bay with or without the basketball team. The Warriors, on the other hand, have yet to make an official decision. Their lease at Oakland's Oracle Arena runs out at the end of the team's 2016-1017 season.

(*Sorry, United States Bocce Champion Benji Tosi)

Previously: Piers 30 and 32 Won't Get Makeovers In Downsized America's Cup Deal
[Chron]