It has been a little over 24 hours since the world
has been rattled by the latest sordid incident courtesy
of the infamous owner of the NBA’s Los Angeles
Clippers, Donald Sterling. To provide a recap, media
outlet TMZ reported that Sterling went on an angry
racist rant in an argument with his girlfriend on April 9th,
a woman named V.Stiviano. This report came complete
with the recording of the argument in which Sterling
goes compeltely ballistic on Stiviano(who is Black and
Mexican by the way) due to her posting a picture to
Instagram of her and NBA legend and corporate magnate
Earvin ‘Magic’ Johnson. The alleged conversation included
such offensive statements as the following:
”You can sleep with [black people]. You can bring them in
, you can do whatever you want. The little I ask you is not
to promote it on that…and not to bring them to my games.”
Sterling also made it very clear how he felt about Magic
Johnson as well:
“Don’t put him on an Instagram for the world to have to
see so they have to call me. And don’t bring him to my games.”
thrilling first round playoff series agains the Golden
State Warriors and are picked by some as NBA Finals
contenders. The response to this recording has been
swift and unceasing from all quarters. Johnson took
to Twitter to publicly condemn Sterling’s words and
behavior and to vow that he and his wife will never
attend another Clippers game so long as Sterling was
it clear in an interview after his team’s Game 3 victory
over the Charlotte Bobcats that he felt ‘there’s no room
for Donald Sterling in the NBA.’ The Clippers players
Rivers visibly angry at an interview session where he
dispelled the notion of a boycott. NBA Commissioner
Adam Silver at a press conference in Memphis, Tennessee
stated that the NBA was thoroughly investigating the
incident and that Sterling has voluntarily agreed not
to attend Game 4 due to tip off this afternoon in
Oakland, California. To take a quote from the great
poet Maya Angelou, “The first time someone shows you
who they are, believe them.” And this is certainly true
in the case of Donald Sterling, who has earned his rep
as possibly the worst owner in American sports with
tarnished stripes.
Truth be told, Sterling has worn this mantle for many
years. After buying the Clippers in 1981 for $12.5 million
in 1981 and moving them from San Diego to L.A.,
he was known to be the cheapest owner in the league.
All of this as his franchise grew to where it now sits
at an estimated value of $575 million dollars. And in his
30-plus years as owner, the team has had only FIVE
winning seasons. Sterling’s racism has been like a
festering wound on a wino passed out in front of a
church getting ready for Sunday service. There’s quite
a few articles from established reporters as Bomani
Jones and Jemele Hill of ESPN as well as Dave Zirin’s
eye-opening piece for The Nation over the past few
years. These reports detail a frugal, crotchety bigot
that Archie Bunker could’ve had a drink with. A man
who in 2009 paid out $2.7 million dollars to settle
a federal lawsuit against him that claimed he refused
to rent apartments to Blacks, Latinos and families
with children in his buildings in Koreatown, the largest
settlement in such a case on record. A man who has
been a serial sexual harasser of women. A man who
reportedly told his former GM Elgin Baylor that he
wanted a “vision of a Southern plantation-type structure”
where “poor Black boys from the South” would be
coached by a white man. Throughout lawsuits and
lurid accounts of his behavior, Sterling has in a sense,
been bulletproof. The NBA has accepted this nonsense
for decades. Yes, accepted. There is no other word to
describe it when you find someone so repugnant has
been allowed to carry on for that long. The league has
enabled Sterling long enough. And for Adam Silver, who
took over the Commissioner’s job from David Stern,
the danger of failing to punish Sterling will severely
damage the reputation of the league and further
anger its players. His quick, lackluster statements
could’ve been better expressed in a stack of Xeroxed
releases handed out. It has an air of cover-up about
it.
Let’s not kid ourselves. People have been demanding
action by the NBA and Clippers players in terms of a
boycott, but both situations probably won’t happen. To
begin with, the tide is beginning to mount in a way against
Stiviano, who is currently named as the defendant in a
lawsuit brought against her by Sterling’s estranged wife,
Rochelle. The suit claims that Stiviano is little more than
a goldigger, who Sterling began to have an affair with in
2010. The suit also claims that Sterling used community
property to buy Stiviano luxury cars worth half a million
dollars and $1.8 million to buy a duplex close to the
Beverly Center. Stiviano apparently claimed that she
would ‘get even’ for being scorned according to the family’s
press statement. Stiviano is already being fingered as the
person who gave the tape to TMZ. And this recording might
be a violation of California’s law against taping without
consent. So it opens the door for her to be more liable
than TMZ for a lawsuit by Sterling. And that would shift
focus away from his misdeeds if it happens. As far as a
player boycott, there’s reasons why it won’t happen. For
one, the legal language appears to protect players if they
chose to sit out the game but they then would face fines
by the league. And Chris Paul, their star point guard and
president of the players’ union, has already conveyed that
they are working with former NBA star and Mayor of
Sacramento, California Kevin Johnson. This is probably so
that the league can try to stave rising anger which could
cause a work stoppage at their most lucrative time of
year. Another reason? Most of these guys don’t want to
ultimately risk their checks and earning power. As much
as you and I might want these cats to basically be Ali or
John Carlos, they aren’t. The most we might get is more
mildly symbolic gestures like DeAndre Jordan’s on Instagram.
Keep in mind that Sterling is also someone who is not
afraid to relentlessly heckle his own players, as Baron
Davis can tell you. The NBA wants this to go away real
quick because it further solidifies a viewpoint that paints
their collection of owners as a billiionaire boys’ club. And
the resolution of racial matters isn’t a strong suit of theirs
either, recently evidenced by their bumbling over the ‘N’
word being used by players.
There’s also been an outcry for the NBA to step in and
get the Clippers away from Sterling. That’s a sticky
situation because with someone as unpredictable as
Sterling is, he could wind up suing the league and its
owners for federal and state antitrust violations. They
can take the steps to suspend him, and then negotiate
behind the scenes to have him sell the team. There is
precedent here with the notorious case of Marge Schott
who owned the Cincinatti Reds of Major League Baseball
and was suspended for her vile comments in 1993 and
again in 1996 until she sold her stake in the team in
1998 facing a third suspension. The NBA has dealt with
this before in the case of Ted Stepien and the Cleveland
Cavaliers in 1983 over racially offensive remarks he
made.
Photo Credit: Deadspin
The main thing is, Donald Sterling can no longer be
shrugged off as a dumb bigoted owner anymore. It’s
almost unbelievable that this fool, the same dude who
had his team celebrate Black History Month in the WRONG
MONTH has flown under the radar. The recorded rant
shows a sad individual, a relic of racisim. The fixation with
Magic? Pure hate and jealousy only a warped mind like
that can conjure. Magic is a shining treasure for the city
of Los Angeles, a legendary athlete, owns Starbucks stores
as well as his own TV network and now, the Los Angeles
Dodgers. It galls Sterling that a Black man can be that
well loved, that supremely successful and make him
look so small as a result. Another reason is that Magic
Johnson as one of the Los Angeles Lakers’ all-time
greats represents achievement his franchise could
never get thanks to his ways. Ironically, he helped
reinforce the Lakers as an NBA dynasty when the late
Dr.Jerry Buss sold Sterling part of his apartment
complexes in 1979 and with the money took over
that team as well as the Kings hockey franchise and
the Forum. He also more than likely felt sexually
inadequate as well - viewing Black people through
the lens of plantation days will give rise to thoughts
of ‘buck nigras’. Listen to the recording and you’ll
hear that in his accusations of Stiviano not being
proper according to him. All in all, Sterling has again
shown just how poisonous he is. And while the NBA
should’ve known and acted better the first time they
saw it, they can’t afford to let it bubble up again.