Commissioner Silver

Well, that was quick, Silver.

I wonder if Adam Silver would be available to also run MLB, the NFL, and the NCAA?

I applaud his decisiveness......

It will be interesting to see if he gets 3/4 of the owners to vote to force a sale.

Capitalists aren't usually down with people telling them what to do.

Many owners will not want to establish a precedent that takes away your property based on something you say in the privacy of your home.

up7587 wrote:Many owners will not want to establish a precedent that takes away your property based on something you say in the privacy of your home.  

That is a fair point, but I don't think the owners will want to establish precedent of tolerating (or appearing to tolerate) racism. Sterling knew the framework of the NBA rules... and it is not like he won't be compensated--he would be forced to sell the team, not forfeit it.

The damage has been done--I don't think any other owner would want Sterling around in any capacity, to distract from the operation$ of league.

Sterling has been an embarrassment for years.  He has been sued and lost for housing discrimination lawsuits.  He's made many out-of-line comments before, and anyone working for him or playing on his team had to know that he's not a good man. Not sure why this incident triggered the firestorm and media frenzy. The vengeful woman will get you, every time.

Given his history, I suspect he won't give up without a fight. I think Silver figured, if there was going to be a court battle, might as well go big, and let the court sort it out. But you're right. With him around, no one will want to work there, and no players will want to be there. Of course, he's made many decisions in the past that hurt the competitiveness of the team, so why would he change now. For the first time ever, the Clipper fans finally had a successful team to root for, and now it's going to blow up. The other NBA owners will be trying to pick off the good Clipper players, for sure.

As Frank  Deford pointed out on Morning Edition this morning, "banned for life" is a relative term in sports.  For the most part the only people where "banned for life" actually lasts more than a few years are players. 
Think the Black Sox or Pete Rose.  Owners are generally re-instated think Marge Schott 2 years and George Steinbrenner 3 years.

A_Fan wrote:As Frank  Deford pointed out on Morning Edition this morning, "banned for life" is a relative term in sports.  For the most part the only people where "banned for life" actually lasts more than a few years are players. 
Think the Black Sox or Pete Rose.  Owners are generally re-instated think Marge Schott 2 years and George Steinbrenner 3 years.

What Frank isn't saying is that the only owner banned for life is maybe the Magicjack guy. That isn't official. He took the whole league down with him.  and so far he isn't back.


lance Armstrong might count. He owned the USPS team, but he's bad support for Frank's argument.


Hardly a huge sample pool to make generalizations about. Owners don't get banned.

Deford is old....this is a different era.  For many years the ugliness that Schott spewed didn't leave the city of Cincinnati....even without the social media of today her drunken outbursts against blacks, gays, and Jews, and her corrupt business dealings eventually gained notoriety.  

Public opinion is a much stronger force today.....even in the late '90's, and despite her wealth and local charisma, Schott was eventually forced to sell the Reds because of public opinion.

Because a guilty verdict has already been rendered in the court of public opinion, I have no doubt the other owners will unanimously agree that Sterling must sell the Clippers.  Sterling is 80,.....I think this will be a lifetime ban!

Marge wasn't banned for life, nor was she forced to sell.
She was suspended for the 1993 season after this incident

a former Oakland Athletics executive assistant, Sharon Jones, is quoted in the New York Times as having overheard Schott state: "I would never hire another n.... I'd rather have a trained monkey working for me than a n....," before the start of an owners' conference call.

She went back to work the day the season ended.


She wasn't even suspended after she made a scene when Umpire John McSherry died on the field and the umps remaining cancelled the game.

After making comments favoring Hitler later that year,
She was banned for two years from 1996 to 1998, then her punishment was lifted.

She sold because it wasn't fun anymore if she couldn't say what she wanted. After she came back and made more comments, he sold when the other owners threatened to oust her ( they had threatened for years), but she was never banned.

Even the Redskins George Preston Marshall, open racist and the last owner  in the NFL to integrate a team was never banned.

When the 'Skins lost to the Browns on a Jim Brown TD, DC sportswriter Shirley Povich famously wrote that Brown finally integrated the 'Skins end zone.


He only drafted Ernie Davis because Robert Kennedy ( after whom the stadium is now named)  told him the federal government would rescind his stadium lease if he didn't integrate the team.  Davis refused to play for him, so they traded to Cleveland for Bobby Mitchell. It was then that the 'Skins started winning.


But Marshall was never banned and died still owning the team.

up7587 wrote:Sterling has been an embarrassment for years.  He has been sued and lost for housing discrimination lawsuits.  He's made many out-of-line comments before, and anyone working for him or playing on his team had to know that he's not a good man. Not sure why this incident triggered the firestorm and media frenzy.

This is the part I find most interesting.  Apparently the NAACP has given him awards in the past, and the LA chapter was about to give him a lifetime achievement award.  

http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2014/04/29/308054638/the-naacps-less-than-sterling-intentions

It's good to see a guy who has these racist attitudes finally get the hammer dropped on him.

IMO, the NAACP, and many other organizations and schools (including UP) have made questionable decisions regarding recognition awards in the past because it is about the $$$$.

I'm not condemning the practice, per se.....it's been a long standing method of raising the $$$$ needed to fund an organization's overall aim/agenda....but once again, when the court of public opinion has made a ruling, the wise leaders will pull the recognition plug immediately.....before further damage is done.

DoubleDipper wrote:IMO, the NAACP, and many other organizations and schools (including UP) have made questionable decisions regarding recognition awards in the past because it is about the $$$$.

Pretty much what the USA Today columnist says:

Because of Sterling's large donations to local charities, including the NAACP, they overlooked his worse than checkered history on race issues and gave him a lifetime achievement award in 2009 — and were about to honor him with a humanitarian award before his racist recording surfaced.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2014/04/30/naacp-nba-cliven-bundy-donald-sterling-clippers-racism-column/8509011/

Not as cut and tried as portrayed. http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/nba/news/20140429/donald-sterling-nba-adam-silver-clippers-lawsuit-lifetime-ban/

Other commentators have noted that if the NBA charter doesn't specifically address this issue, Sterling may have a civil rights conspiracy case for punishing him for free expression.

Though Sterling is unsympathetic, not only a racist but apparently unliked and not trusted by many of his former employees, one can make a case that the punishment for his reprehensible, unwise private comments is disproportionate to the offense.

The bar against participating in any way with his team is one thing, and a significant sanction itself, but the coerced sell of his prize property in a land which reveres unfettered freedom in all things economic, well that may lead to litigation.

He is a lesson to us all about the potential effect of money and power.

wrv wrote:
He is a lesson to us all about the potential effect of money and power.

We have had enough lessons this millennium. We don't need more schooling on the subject.

Well, no one could reasonably contest the fact that the corrupting influence of money and power and the examples of it known to the public are a runaway train, too many perhaps to reasonably count. It is the use of the lessons that is in doubt . . .

Perhaps someone somewhere will learn something from the ordeal through which Mr. Sterling going.

wrv wrote:Perhaps someone somewhere will learn something from the ordeal through which Mr. Sterling going.

You mean, don't fool around with girls a third your age??

up7587 wrote:

wrv wrote:Perhaps someone somewhere will learn something from the ordeal through which Mr. Sterling going.

You mean, don't fool around with girls a third your age??  

Nelson Rockefeller taught us that....

What a scandal Sterling is . . .