Update: Donald Sterling Backs Out on Deal and Sues NBA for $1 Billion

[JamesG]

Clippers Owner Donald Sterling Banned for Life by the NBA
4/29/13


Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling has been banned for life by the NBA in response to racist comments the league says he made in a recorded conversation.

Commissioner Adam Silver said he will try to force the controversial owner to sell his franchise. Sterling has also been fined $2.5 million, and Silver made no effort to hide his outrage over the comments.

"I fully expect to get the support I need from the other NBA owners I need to remove him," Silver said.





The rebuke, which came three days after the scandal broke, is the harshest penalty ever issued by the league and one of the stiffest punishments ever given to an owner in professional sports. Silver said a league investigation found the NBA's longest-tenured owner was in fact the person on the audiotapes that were released over the weekend.

"We stand together in condemning Mr. Sterling's views," Silver said. "They simply have no place in the NBA."





Sterling is immediately barred from attending any NBA games or practices, be present at any Clippers office or facility, or participate in any business or player personnel decisions involving the team.

He also cannot participate in any league business going forward. It's unclear how he will respond, and a lawsuit certainly seems possible.

"This league is far bigger than any one owner, any one coach and any one player," Silver said.





The fine will be donated to organizations dedicated to anti-discrimination and tolerance efforts that will be jointly selected by the NBA and the Players Association, Silver said.

"This has all happened in three days, and so I am hopeful there will be no long-term damage to the league and to the Clippers organization," Silver said. "But as I said earlier, I'm outraged so I certainly understand other people's outrage. This will take some time and appropriate healing will be necessary."

After the announcement, the Clippers' website had a simple message: "We are one," it read.

http://www.aol.com/article/2014/04/2...-nba/20877673/

[TMC]

http://officialfan.proboards.com/thr...d-life?page=14

The big thing was in apartment buildings he owned, he refused to rent to African Americans, and hated renting to Hispanics. He told Elgin Baylor he wanted a team of "poor black kids from the south and a white coach", and he refused to give Baylor a raise, while giving Mike Dunleavey a 4 year $22 million contract. Baylor was making less than half a million a year.

• He bought a whole bunch of land in LA, claiming it was for a homeless shelter. He even created a foundation for it, however, nearly a decade later there's been nothing on it and it's widely assumed that he just bought the land for the real estate value.

• The federal government got him on housing discrimination suits. Basically, he'd refuse to rent to blacks or Hispanics in certain areas. In one case, one tenant was trying to get damage fixed in her apartment and he basically evicted her because she was one of those black people that smelled. While this suit was going on, he and his council tried to delay it excessively, presumably to make it as expensive as possible to the people suing him, so he was forced to pay a huge fine for that.

• He had another employment discrimination case against him with a black member of the staff accusing him of paying him significantly less than the white staff, and included a claim that Sterling told said employee he wanted a plantation like atmosphere, with a bunch of poor black kids from the south with a white head coach.

• As an owner, he was notoriously frugal, basically making it impossible for his team to compete while he took in a lot of money from the TV deals and such related to his market. He heckled players of his own team, refused to pay prizes for contestants who won them, and when an assistant coach got pancreatic cancer, the players paid for it because Sterling refused to help.

[RetroGuy2000]

He is an awful, awful human being. Let's hope getting banned from a sport he loves is a wake-up call for him.

But I doubt it. People as rich as him never really change.

[Zoneboy]

Originally Posted by TMC

http://officialfan.proboards.com/thr...d-life?page=14

• He bought a whole bunch of land in LA, claiming it was for a homeless shelter. He even created a foundation for it, however, nearly a decade later there's been nothing on it and it's widely assumed that he just bought the land for the real estate value.

• The federal government got him on housing discrimination suits. Basically, he'd refuse to rent to blacks or Hispanics in certain areas. In one case, one tenant was trying to get damage fixed in her apartment and he basically evicted her because she was one of those black people that smelled. While this suit was going on, he and his council tried to delay it excessively, presumably to make it as expensive as possible to the people suing him, so he was forced to pay a huge fine for that.

• He had another employment discrimination case against him with a black member of the staff accusing him of paying him significantly less than the white staff, and included a claim that Sterling told said employee he wanted a plantation like atmosphere, with a bunch of poor black kids from the south with a white head coach.

• As an owner, he was notoriously frugal, basically making it impossible for his team to compete while he took in a lot of money from the TV deals and such related to his market. He heckled players of his own team, refused to pay prizes for contestants who won them, and when an assistant coach got pancreatic cancer, the players paid for it because Sterling refused to help.

None of this would surprise me if it were true but all this came from another message board and I didn't see any links to verifiable sources. I'm sorry but I just don't understand the point of bringing comments from another board onto this one. It's no different than taking comments from here and posting them on that board. If we're going to have a discussion then it should be amongst ourselves. TJ might not have an issue with it and that's fine but I-for-one would not want any comments I've made here took to that site or any other without my consent.

[robyrob]

he's a horrible person and says and does terrible things, but lets face it - he doesn't give a rat's ass what anyone thinks, that fine is nothing to him and I'm pretty sure he doesn't care that he will never get to play another game in the NBA.

[James28]

Sterling was a team owner, not a player.

But everyone here is right: Sterling is an unapologetic racist pig. He doesn't deserve to own a team, be associated with a sports team or league, or maybe even be a rich person. He is officially on the SitcomsOnline "Enemies of the World" list.

Trivia: Around three fourths of the NBA's players are Black or African American. Sterling's controversial comment was: "Don't bring Black People to my games." He is probably an opponent to cultural diversity, although he is Jewish himself.

[MrCleveland]

Originally Posted by James28

Sterling was a team owner, not a player.

But everyone here is right: Sterling is an unapologetic racist pig. He doesn't deserve to own a team, be associated with a sports team or league, or maybe even be a rich person. He is officially on the SitcomsOnline "Enemies of the World" list.

Trivia: Around three fourths of the NBA's players are Black or African American. Sterling's controversial comment was: "Don't bring Black People to my games." He is probably an opponent to cultural diversity, although he is Jewish himself.

Sterling might as well have shouted the word "******" in front of the crowd!

Love your enemies...Sterling will die a cold and lonely jerk and will probably be in hell for this...he's already in basketball hell!

[cleverfun3000]

[MrCleveland]

I now made a song about the scandal...

www.amiright.com/parody/80s/gregkihnband9.shtml

Feel free to comment!...I even have a spoken dialogue like from this song....

[isiahthomas]

Donald Sterling is a racist fa*got. I'm glad the NBA banned him. I see he's racist towards blacks and hispanics that are his tenants at the apartments he owns. So f*ck him. He claims that he's friends with Magic Johnson. If that's true, then why diss him? Why would he be jealous because he saw a picture of Magic with his girlfriend if he was his friend? I was glad his girlfriend recorded the conversation she had with him when he made those racist comments about blacks so she could expose him to the public. His dumb ass isn't gonna win his lawsuit against the NBA. So he's wasting his time going to court.

[James28]

It was announced on 23 May 2014 that Donald Sterling has reportedly hand over control of the Los Angeles Clippers to his wife, Shelly Sterling, who is now negotiating with the NBA over its sale.

[isiahthomas]

I saw that a white guy billionaire just bought the Clippers and he's waiting on the NBA to approve his bid. Donald Sterling said he dropped his lawsuit against the NBA and i'm glad he did that because he wasn't gonna win anyway.

[JamesG]

Donald Sterling Pulls Support from Clippers sale, Suing NBA Again
by Zach Harper, NBA Writer
June 9, 2014


The Donald Sterling saga is far from over.

Shelley Sterling and former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer have already agreed to a sale of the Los Angeles Clippers for $2 billion and the NBA has agreed to let the transfer of ownership of the team replace the process of removing Sterling as the owner of the team.



After Donald Sterling gave his support to the deal and abandoned a $1 billion federal lawsuit against the NBA, it looks like he's now going against the sale.

Sterling has pulled his support of the sale of the franchise to Ballmer and is now re-pursuing his lawsuit against the league, according to his lawyer Max Blecher.







From The Associated Press:

Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling has pulled his support from a deal to sell the team to former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and will pursue his $1 billion federal lawsuit against the NBA, his attorney said Monday.

"We have been instructed to prosecute the lawsuit," said attorney Maxwell Blecher. He said co-owner Donald Sterling would not be signing off on the deal to sell.

The $2 billion sale was negotiated by his wife Shelly Sterling after Donald Sterling's racist remarks to a girlfriend were publicized and the NBA moved to oust him as owner.



The lawsuit alleges the league violated his constitutional rights by relying on information from an "illegal" recording that publicized racist remarks he made to a girlfriend.

It also said the league committed a breach of contract by fining Sterling $2.5 million and that it violated antitrust laws by trying to force a sale.

The NBA's unwillingness to revoke a $2.5 million fine against Sterling and a lifetime ban from the league seems to have spurred the reversal of his blessing toward the sale.

This isn't likely to keep the sale of the franchise from going through, nor did NBA commissioner Adam Silver seem very concerned with a potential lawsuit when he addressed the media before Game 2 of the NBA Finals.

This is just yet another reversal of course and overall waste of time in Sterling's attempt to delay the inevitable.

http://www.cbssports.com/nba/eye-on-...uing-nba-again

[isiahthomas]

I wanna say that i'm tired of blacks getting upset when whites call them nig*ers when they call each other nig*ers. Blacks are so damn hypocritical and we hate each other. So why get upset when whites call blacks nig*ers? I remember when the Donald Sterling situation first happened, every black person in the NBA and some rappers like Little Wayne and Snoop Dogg had something to say about it. Why don't Little Wayne and Snoop Dogg stop saying nig*ers in their rap songs? Why don't they stop rapping about blacks killing each other and stop rapping about being ignorant? Snoop is 43 years old and he still acts like he's a teenager. I've seen a few of his interviews on his own network on Youtube and he's interviewed a few rappers and black comedians and he constantly uses the word nig*a and he curses often.


Clippers coach Doc Rivers and Clippers player Chris Paul were talking about that they didn't wanna play and coach the Clippers if Donald remained the owner. I think they need to stop tripping about what he did and concentrate on getting paid. Doc sounds stupid because any NBA team he coaches, he's gonna be working for a white owner and most white owners are racist. So he's not gonna wanna coach because most white team owners are racist? So what. Get your money Doc because that's what it's about. His bills aren't gonna stop coming to him because he's not coaching LOL. His bills still gotta get paid. Chris Paul said he was gonna sit out some games if Donald was still the owner. Well i guess they should be happy now since the team got bought by a white guy who worked for Microsoft or was the owner of Microsoft. White people have been calling blacks nig*ers since blacks were slaves and they're not gonna stop doing that. Blacks need to stop calling each other nig*ers because that's a ignorant word and that word is how whites feel about blacks.