NBA Betting: Who Will Be Next Owners Of Los Angeles Clippers?
by Bovada Sportsbook Staff | May 12, 2014
The Los Angeles Clippers have played very admirably in the wake of the Donald Sterling scandal that engulfed the team and became national news a couple of weeks ago. L.A., after a minor hiccup right after the story broke, eliminated the Golden State Warriors in seven games in the first round of the NBA playoffs.
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The third-seeded Clippers are tied 2-2 in the Western Conference semifinals against the No. 2 Thunder after a huge L.A. rally in Game 4 on Sunday. The series shifts back to Oklahoma City for Game 5 on Tuesday night. OKC is a 5.5-point favorite on Bovada’s NBA odds and there will be live betting available. Los Angeles is looking for its first-ever trip to the conference finals.
So while Coach Doc Rivers has done a marvelous job keeping the players’ focus on the court, it’s likely another type of court that will determine the future direction of the Clipper franchise. That would be a U.S. court of law.
When NBA commissioner Adam Silver banned Sterling from the NBA for life, that was well within his powers as written in the NBA constitution. All owners have to agree to that. Silver is a lawyer and then did something smart: He passed the buck to the other NBA owners to throw Sterling out of the league. Technically Sterling did nothing illegal with his racist comments. There’s also the whole First Amendment issue. If Silver had used his own powers to force Sterling to sell the team, then that could have been overturned in the courts.
Now it’s on the other 29 owners and if 75 percent of those vote to give Sterling the boot, and it’s expected to be unanimous, it’s not thought he will have much legal recourse in the courts. That’s not to say
Sterling won’t sue — he is one of the most litigious people alive today. It’s how he has become a billionaire.
Bovada released an interesting prop on who will own the Clippers at the start of the 2014-15 season. The Sterling Family is the -300 favorite and any other group is +200. There are two caveats there. If Sterling’s wife Shelly owns 50 percent of the team then, the Sterling Family would be the winning side. If the NBA is in temporary ownership, then the any other group is the winner.
Since then a large assortment of billionaires have said they might be interested in buying the Clippers. They are led by former Lakers star Magic Johnson, who is part of the ownership group of the Dodgers; Oprah Winfrey, Floyd Mayweather, Oscar De La Hoya, Oracle boss Larry Ellison and entertainment mogul David Geffen. Ellison, Geffen and Winfrey have been talked about as a single bidding group and financially couldn’t be beaten. Ellison alone is worth nearly $50 billion and is the fifth-richest man in the world. The Clippers are likely to become the first NBA franchise to sell for at least $1 billion. That’s pocket change to Ellison, who owns a Hawaiian island.
The person who could really put a wrinkle in all this and force it to drag out even longer in the courts is Shelly Sterling, who has been allowed to attend Clippers games since her husband’s ban. Shelly is estranged from Sterling and under California law would be entitled to 50 percent of Sterling’s assets, thus 50 percent of the team. She has said she wants to keep that half and bring in an investment group to buy her husband’s half.
Here’s a key quote Silver said when announcing Sterling’s ban:"There have been no decisions about other members of the Sterling family, and I should say that this ruling applies specifically to Donald Sterling and Donald Sterling’s conduct only."
Thus the rest of the Sterling family would seem to be in the clear. Obviously the NBA wants the Sterling name gone for good, but in this case, they could be fighting a losing battle. This seems unlikely to be fully decided before the start of next season, which could hurt the franchise in the long run because some players may not want to go there.
