NEW YORK -- The two groups bidding for an NBA expansion team in Charlotte made their sales pitches to the league Monday, and the winner is expected to be announced by midweek.

Robert Johnson, founder of Black Entertainment Television, was the first to make his hourlong presentation. He was followed by businessman Steven Belkin, whose group includes Hall of Famer Larry Bird.

The expansion committee is expected to issue a recommendation Tuesday or Wednesday. The full Board of Governors, with one representative from each of the 29 teams, will vote in early January to approve the new ownership group.

The Charlotte team would begin play in the 2004-05 season.

"There have been times in the past when we've had a couple of groups and it was pretty easy to determine who the winner was," said committee chairman and Phoenix Suns owner Jerry Colangelo. "This is a tough, because both groups bring an awful lot to the table."

The price tag for the expansion team is expected to be $300 million, and both prospective owners have deep pockets.

The team will play its first season in the Charlotte Coliseum, where the Hornets played before owner George Shinn moved them to New Orleans. The expansion team would then move into a new $260 million uptown arena.

Johnson, a billionaire, is seeking to become the first black majority owner in the NBA.

"In a business where 85 percent of the employees -- if you want to call players making on average $4.4 million a year employees -- are African-American, it would make sense for the league to consider diversity as a goal, as an objective," Johnson said.

"Diversity shouldn't drive the decision, but diversity, in my opinion, in our society and in the structure of the league, must be considered," he added.

Colangelo said Johnson played down the issue of race during his presentation.

"He doesn't want to be awarded the franchise because he's African-American," Colangelo said. "He wants his track record to speak for itself, in terms of his entrepreneurship and his success."

M.L. Carr, a former player and coach for the Boston Celtics who is part of the Belkin group, said Johnson's ethnicity should not be a determining factor.

"The one thing you have to understand is that there is no affirmative action for billionaires," said Carr, who is black.

From the standpoint of having a famous face to lead the franchise, the Belkin group has an advantage since it already has named Bird the director of basketball operations. Bird has been out of the NBA since his three-year stint as head coach of the Indiana Pacers ended following the 1999-00 season.

"We're very confident we're going to get this," Bird said. "We feel we have a good team together. We had a lot to do with getting the new building, so we think we've got a good chance. I ain't worried about a fallback."

Colangelo and deputy commissioner Russ Granik gave no overt preference for Johnson or Belkin, although the executives did stress that the new owner will need to move quickly to begin building the franchise.

That might be construed as a positive sign for the Belkin group, which emphasized in its presentation that it has been preparing for eight months and is ready to hit the ground running if awarded the franchise.

"The team with the most substance, the team that has all the players in place, has to be given important consideration," Belkin said.

Johnson, based in Washington, D.C., is friends with Michael Jordan and might be tempted to try to lure him to the new franchise if Jordan chose not to buy back his ownership stake in the Washington Wizards. Jordan has said he won't play after this season, his second with the Wizards.

Granik said Johnson did not mention Jordan in his presentation.

Johnson played down the importance of Bird's involvement, delivering the best one-liner heard during the three separate news conferences.

"Just as I didn't need an actor or actress to build BET, I don't need a ballplayer to build a successful franchise," Johnson said. "If I hire the right basketball operations guy, his goal is to put on my team the next Larry Bird."

The Charlotte team will fill its roster through a dispersal draft in which every other NBA team could protect eight players.

Granik indicated that the Charlotte team would not be saddled with the same type of draft restrictions as those imposed on Toronto and Vancouver when the league last expanded in 1995. The Raptors and Grizzlies were ineligible to select first in the draft until they had completed four seasons.

One of the owners on the expansion committee is Shinn, who moved the Hornets to New Orleans because of lagging attendance in Charlotte and the inability to secure a deal for a new arena.

Also on the committee are Colangelo, Larry Tanenbaum of Toronto, Joe Maloof of Sacramento, Lewis Katz of New Jersey, Stan Kroenke of Denver, Peter Holt of San Antonio and Bob Vander Weide of Orlando.