What is the next step for the Los Angeles Clippers?
Yahoo Sports Daily hosts Caroline Fenton and Jason Fitz are joined by Yahoo Sports NBA contributing writer Tom Haberstroh to discuss what is next for the Los Angeles Clippers after receiving their punishment from the NBA. Watch the full episode of Yahoo Sports Daily on YouTube or YahooSports.TV .
Video Transcript
Textbook crisis PR would tell you step one, accept guilt, step two, apologize.
Clippers are not doing that.
In fact, they put out a statement and said they, quote, "Vehemently reject the NBA's findings," and added that they will vigorously challenge the findings and penalties.
What's the next step for the Clippers, and how messy do you think that this could get?
Yeah, like I said, this could go to the courts.
This could be brought in, into the, the, the judicial system in America.
But, as Michael McCann of Sportico pointed out, this is a private enterprise that they're engaging in, and this is something that in the collective bargaining agreement and the constitution of the NBA that the 30 owners all agree to, is that the final say is with the commissioner and the, and the, the, the league office on matters such as this.
And $30 million, again, that's not going to make Steve Ballmer lose any sleep.
That could've been 300 million.
I don't think that that would make Steve Ballmer think twice about doing this again.
But the fact of the matter is that Adam Silver also dropped the sledgehammer on Steve Ballmer because this is the second time that this has happened.
And I think the message that he's sending to Steve Ballmer, Adam Silver, is fool me once, fool me twice, but three times?
If you do this again, Clippers, you're out of the league.
That's my read, because a one-year penalty, a one-year ban from Steve Ballmer could've been a five-year ban, could've been, an outright ban for life like he did to St- Donald Sterling at the start of his commissioner tenure.
And so I think if Steve Ballmer fights this and tries to engage in cap circumvention, conduct again In 2015, he went into a meeting, and the NBA found that this was an accurate telling of the story, is he went into a meeting with his Clippers executives and promised an illegal endorsement deal to DeAndre Jordan if he signed with the Clippers, and the Clippers were fined $250,000 for that.
This is the second case where they've been found, to be engaging in cap circumvention.
A third time?
What happens if it happens a third time?
I think Steve Ballmer's gonna be forced out of the league.
Because all these owners, they agree to rules, and they abide by these rules in order for there to be a fair and competitive balance in the league.
And so where does this go from here?
Man, he is worth $150 billion.
That's a lot of legal fees, but, the federal judges who look at, at such a lawsuit, we saw with Donald Sterling when he tried to fight Adam Silver and the league office in the court system, the judges threw it out and dismissed the case.
So we'll see, but I think the NBA's making a message loud and clear.
You try this again, and this is gonna look a whole lot worse.
