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Would you vote to take the Clippers from Donald Sterling?

Donald Sterling must sell his NBA team


  • Total voters
    56
  • Poll closed .
I've thought long and hard about this.

I ended up voting "no," and here's why. First of all, what he said, in my opinion, was just awful. It was a terrible thing to say, and just proves that racism is alive and well. That being said, he said it in the privacy of his home, and was illegally taped doing so. You shouldn't be forcibly punished for something you say. That being said, I don't think he deserves to own the team. He should lose the team, but he should lose it the hard way - by losing sponsers, by losing players, etc. There are worse ways to hurt somebody than to force them to sell their team for hundreds of millions of dollars. That's not going to hurt him at all. He still has his money.

Hit him where it hurts - in the wallet - and that will be the best punishment.
 
The NBA Owners are going to vote on whether to force Donald Sterling to sell the LA Clippers because of the racist comments he made on that tape that was secretly recorded by his wife.

If you had a vote in that situation, would you vote "Yes" to force him to sell the team, or do you think he shouldn't be forced to see his team and vote "no".


After you vote, please explain your position.

My vote is no - I'm strongly opposed to mob rule dictating personal rights.

Just as an aside, I'd like to know when the current "ownership" agreement language came into effect. Was it before or after Sterling purchased his team? If it had been in place prior to his gaining ownership, then I'm more receptive to the position that he breached his agreement with the league. If, however, the agreement language came into effect after his purchase of the team - if new language was voted on by the ownership group without unanimous consent - then I'm less receptive to the league position. If he was an owner and he was forced to sign off on new ownership language he disagreed with that seems like coercion to me.
 
The NBA Owners are going to vote on whether to force Donald Sterling to sell the LA Clippers because of the racist comments he made on that tape that was secretly recorded by his wife.

If you had a vote in that situation, would you vote "Yes" to force him to sell the team, or do you think he shouldn't be forced to see his team and vote "no".

After you vote, please explain your position.

I think I'd probably vote that he should be forced to sell it. Doesn't make me happy. Apparently, though, those are the rules. I think it's reasonable to expect that there's a price to be paid for voicing one's prejudice as a public figure. Yes! Yes, I know! He didn't do it in public. But it became public. End of story.

Paying a hefty price for inappropriate comments/conduct is certainly not without precedent. Think Dog The Bounty Hunter; Alec Baldwin; professional sports players who've lost their endorsements because of their conduct.

How can you expect to stay as owner of a basketball team when you've as much as said you're racist? Was he tricked into it? Absolutely. And she even covered herself from a charge of illegal recording by saying he'd asked her to keep recordings of his conversations. The man's an idiot.

I do think it should be a fair sale and not a fire sale, though. With him putting the team into his wife's sole name, perhaps he's bought some time...
 
The vast majority of the NBA players are racist.

1. Dennis Rodman -> Made racist comments against Larry Bird and got away with it. If a white player were have made the same comments about black players, there would have been outrage and demanding that he sell all of his persoanal assesses..

2. Kobe Bryant -> Committing flagrant fouls only to foreigners and minorities.

3. Shaq -> Racist against Asians.

4. Isiah Thomas -> Made racist comments against Larry Bird, making stupid statements about white people in court during his legal troubles.

5. KG -> Sucker punching white people.



Heya Apache.
hello2.gif
I was just thinking about some of the stuff Rodman has said.....still think if someone like Lebron is caught on a Cellphone in some rant and they catch him using racial language.....my my my, just think how things are going to get ugly about Forcing one such as him out......in shame.
 
Sterling was stripped by the government from his rights and freedoms? No? Then he wasn't stripped of his rights and freedoms.

FFS, I said "without fear of government or entrepreneurial reprisal."
 
I think I'd probably vote that he should be forced to sell it. Doesn't make me happy. Apparently, though, those are the rules. I think it's reasonable to expect that there's a price to be paid for voicing one's prejudice as a public figure. Yes! Yes, I know! He didn't do it in public. But it became public. End of story.

Paying a hefty price for inappropriate comments/conduct is certainly not without precedent. Think Dog The Bounty Hunter; Alec Baldwin; professional sports players who've lost their endorsements because of their conduct.

How can you expect to stay as owner of a basketball team when you've as much as said you're racist? Was he tricked into it? Absolutely. And she even covered herself from a charge of illegal recording by saying he'd asked her to keep recordings of his conversations. The man's an idiot.

I do think it should be a fair sale and not a fire sale, though. With him putting the team into his wife's sole name, perhaps he's bought some time...

I dissagree... You don't take away a persons legally owned business because they're an idiot, or because of something they said.... That's not the America I know.

Just let the free market punish him, and believe me, it will. Here's what I said earlier:

For you race hustlers out there who are chomping at the bit to pounce on me, play the race card and accuse me wanting a racist to get a free pass, you couldn't be farther from the truth. Allowing Sterling to keep his team is anything but a free pass. If he is allowed to keep the team, the free market will punish him to a far greater degree financially, than forcing him to sell the team now would, and assure that the public backlash doesn't fade away anytime soon.

If you force him to sell the team now, he will get a good price because the true financial backlash from his comments have not diminished the teams value as of yet. Allowing him to keep the team and to continue to manage it, will result in every decent, marketable player on the team to flee after the season ends and contracts expire, and no player of any quality will ever sign a contract to play with the Clippers. Meaning they are guaranteed to be losing, last place team for as long as he is owner, and season tickets, which is a huge revenue stream for NBA teams, would virtually vanish next season. Then there's the issue of TV revenue, sponsors and endorsements. No company in their right mind would want to associate, much less sponsor the Clippers, meaning that local TV will not be able to sell advertising for games and the clippers games will not be televised. The same would likely happen with radio also and would in effect, cut off every major revenue stream and in a very short amount of time, totally bankrupt the organisation... Sterling will then be stuck with a worthless franchise that's costing him millions, that nobody will be interested in buying, and even if he did manage to find a buyer, would only get a small fraction of what he would get if he is forced to sell the team now, while it's still marketable.

There is one more bright spot in letting him keep the team... If he is forced out now, this whole issue disappears in a few years and Sterling's life on a personal level, a comfort level, will return to normal and he won't suffer any more grief publicly over his words. Keeping the team however, will keep him in the spotlight, keep his name in the newspapers, keep him in the publics eye, and guarantee that this issue will not go away so easily. He'll have to deal with the public backlash for many years and possibly, for the rest of his life.
 
I dissagree... You don't take away a persons legally owned business because they're an idiot, or because of something they said.... That's not the America I know.

Just let the free market punish him, and believe me, it will. Here's what I said earlier:

Grim, I like what you said earlier. Makes sense to me. However, he signed away his rights in his membership contract. The NBA probably doesn't want the Clippers to become a national joke. I think that's the reason for the clause(s) in their contracts that allow such maneuvering.
 
Heya 29A. :2wave: Yeah......but what do the Athletes do now. Since people are out to catch them now making racial remarks. Anywhere and with Any Sport? NBA specifically and then the NFL.

Hey, MMC. :) Not sure of the NFL's player contract, but the NBA players are at least bound by Article 35 of the NBA's constitution, hopefully they've read it, as it does prohibit remarks of a prejudicial nature.

NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION UNIFORM PLAYER CONTRACT
http://www.nbpa.org/sites/default/files/EXHIBIT A.pdf
 
Heya Apache.
hello2.gif
I was just thinking about some of the stuff Rodman has said.....still think if someone like Lebron is caught on a Cellphone in some rant and they catch him using racial language.....my my my, just think how things are going to get ugly about Forcing one such as him out......in shame.

Some years ago a sports reporter for the Los Angeles Times wrote an article about NBA fans in particular with Laker fans, white laker fans on how they always talk in the "first person" as if they were on the court playing with the Lakers. It's alway "We won." or "We lost." Never "the lakers won," or "the lakers lost."

Listen to NFL fans or baseball, ice hockey, America's Cup, horse racing, etc. It's rarely in the first person, it's usually the Packers won, the Bears won, Dodgers lost, Kings won, Seattle Slew won by a nose. But when it comes to NBA basketball, it's always in the first person "we won" or "we lost."

Then the reporter went on in reference to all of these white NBA Laker fans who talk as if they were on the team and asking if they knew that the majority of the Lakers probably personally wouldn't like them and likely refer to them as honkies or crackers..
 
The NBA Owners are going to vote on whether to force Donald Sterling to sell the LA Clippers because of the racist comments he made on that tape that was secretly recorded by his wife.

If you had a vote in that situation, would you vote "Yes" to force him to sell the team, or do you think he shouldn't be forced to see his team and vote "no".


After you vote, please explain your position.

If a CEO of a corporation says something really, really stupid, and the thing that he said will so damage the brand of that corporation that they will lose a great deal of money, the DUTY of the board of directors will be to replace him ASAP, that they can protect the brand and not lose a great deal of money.

Sterling said something that would cost the NBA a minimum of tens of millions of dollars in revenue - if they did not act quickly and decisively, then the public would have perceived their inaction as tacit tolerance of (if not agreement with) Sterling and his comments...and perception is everything.

In other words, the reason the other owners had to vote to take away the Clippers for him was to protect the revenue stream of all owners, because they all would have suffered significant losses as a direct result. Their actions, then, were their fiduciary DUTY as part of the group of owners of NBA teams.
 
Hey, MMC. :) Not sure of the NFL's player contract, but the NBA players are at least bound by Article 35 of the NBA's constitution, hopefully they've read it, as it does prohibit remarks of a prejudicial nature.

NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION UNIFORM PLAYER CONTRACT
http://www.nbpa.org/sites/default/files/EXHIBIT A.pdf

It's obvious that Barack Obama never read the Constitution or paid attention to the oath of POTUS he took.

Wait a minute, doesn't Obama also shoot hoops ?

Must be a basketball thing.
 
Hey, MMC. :) Not sure of the NFL's player contract, but the NBA players are at least bound by Article 35 of the NBA's constitution, hopefully they've read it, as it does prohibit remarks of a prejudicial nature.

NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION UNIFORM PLAYER CONTRACT
http://www.nbpa.org/sites/default/files/EXHIBIT A.pdf



Yeah, I heard that they were bringing this up on a Radio show......that when they got into the players and all they do. Including those caught up with coming crimes and breaking the law. Or Leagues rules. How the NBA and or NFL will react when its one of their Big time money makers. Wherein they were protected by the Leagues.

Now they wont be able to do that, since the liberal MS Media wanted to push this agenda of PC to hold accountable a persons private conversations.....even if they are Jerks.
 
Some years ago a sports reporter for the Los Angeles Times wrote an article about NBA fans in particular with Laker fans, white laker fans on how they always talk in the "first person" as if they were on the court playing with the Lakers. It's alway "We won." or "We lost." Never "the lakers won," or "the lakers lost."

Listen to NFL fans or baseball, ice hockey, America's Cup, horse racing, etc. It's rarely in the first person, it's usually the Packers won, the Bears won, Dodgers lost, Kings won, Seattle Slew won by a nose. But when it comes to NBA basketball, it's always in the first person "we won" or "we lost."

Then the reporter went on in reference to all of these white NBA Laker fans who talk as if they were on the team and asking if they knew that the majority of the Lakers probably personally wouldn't like them and likely refer to them as honkies or crackers..



But its okay for Comedy.....Right? Otherwise we will have to get rid of the Eddie Murphy and Chris Rock types? Or damn.....even Russell Peters. Oh wait he's Canadian, they can still say what they want to say in private in Canada, without getting into trouble. :confused:
 
The NBA Owners are going to vote on whether to force Donald Sterling to sell the LA Clippers because of the racist comments he made on that tape that was secretly recorded by his wife.

If you had a vote in that situation, would you vote "Yes" to force him to sell the team, or do you think he shouldn't be forced to see his team and vote "no".


After you vote, please explain your position.

I do not see how any authority exists to do so.

Only government may deprive any person of life, liberty, or property; and only through due process of law, in accordance with an allegation of illegal behavior, through a process in which the subject of such an action is given fair and just chance to defend himself against those accusations.

I have yet to hear of any credible claim that Mr. Sterling has violated any law. All of this is over a conversation which he thought was private, in which he expressed an opinion that most find disagreeable. He has every right to hold that opinion, and he has every right to express it; and nobody has any right or authority to deprive him of his rightful property or of the use thereof, because they don't like this opinion.
 
I think I'd probably vote that he should be forced to sell it. Doesn't make me happy. Apparently, though, those are the rules. I think it's reasonable to expect that there's a price to be paid for voicing one's prejudice as a public figure. Yes! Yes, I know! He didn't do it in public. But it became public. End of story.

Paying a hefty price for inappropriate comments/conduct is certainly not without precedent. Think Dog The Bounty Hunter; Alec Baldwin; professional sports players who've lost their endorsements because of their conduct.

How can you expect to stay as owner of a basketball team when you've as much as said you're racist? Was he tricked into it? Absolutely. And she even covered herself from a charge of illegal recording by saying he'd asked her to keep recordings of his conversations. The man's an idiot.

I do think it should be a fair sale and not a fire sale, though. With him putting the team into his wife's sole name, perhaps he's bought some time...
Losing endorsements is more appropriate than having something which you own taken from you. I don't equate the two in terms of severity.
 
Losing endorsements is more appropriate than having something which you own taken from you. I don't equate the two in terms of severity.

I agree. People sign their rights away every day when they sign contracts. That's the ONLY way it's going to happen. He signed the contract. That's what the contract says.
 
If a CEO of a corporation says something really, really stupid, and the thing that he said will so damage the brand of that corporation that they will lose a great deal of money, the DUTY of the board of directors will be to replace him ASAP, that they can protect the brand and not lose a great deal of money.

A CEO is an employee of a company. There is certainly some basis on which to suggest that a CEO should be subject to some action, up to possibly even being fired, if he says or does something that is harmful to his employer.

Mr. Sterling is not an employee. He's an owner. The team in question is his property. Demanding that the owner of a business sell that business—in fact, making any demand at all regarding what the owner of a business may or must do with his business—is completely different than a business demanding anything of an employee.
 
I agree. People sign their rights away every day when they sign contracts. That's the ONLY way it's going to happen. He signed the contract. That's what the contract says.

If what I have read is fully correct, the pertinent portion(s) of the contract he signed are extremely vague. All an owner has to do is something that "adversely affects" the league. Define that, please (the league, not you). Lots of things fall into that category, and pretty much all of them are ignored. Said vagueness and subsequent cherry-picked enforcement only serves to emphasize the politically correct aspect of this whole situation.

Hence, why I prefer the standard for forced selling to be having been convicted of a crime, or something to that effect.
 
The NBA Owners are going to vote on whether to force Donald Sterling to sell the LA Clippers because of the racist comments he made on that tape that was secretly recorded by his wife.

If you had a vote in that situation, would you vote "Yes" to force him to sell the team, or do you think he shouldn't be forced to see his team and vote "no".


After you vote, please explain your position.

I don’t know. Did he do anything illegal? Did he break any laws? Has he discriminated against anyone? There is an old saying, “Actions speak louder than words.” Perhaps not in this case though. It does seem that Sterling has done everything in his power to make the Clippers a very competitive team and has rewarded his players regardless of race handsomely.

I really don’t know, I suppose if one places words over and above actions, yes. If not, then no. But as Brett Butler told Scarlet O’Hara, “Frankly my dear…..
 
Let's just remember, for all those who cite that Sterling signed an ownership agreement, that Al Davis signed a similar ownership agreement as owner of the Oakland, sometimes Los Angeles, Raiders. Part of his agreement was that he couldn't relocate his team without the consent of the other owners in the league - he signed that agreement - and yet, a court of law sided with him when he moved his team from Oakland to LA and then back again to Oakland. There was a similar occurrence, if I'm not mistaken, when Art Model moved the Cleveland Browns to Baltimore. In those cases, and others, the financial interests of the owners of the teams prevailed over arbitrary decisions made by the league's commissioner and other owners in the league. The same could easily be said for the NBA and its commissioner in this case.

I wish Sterling would take the league to court just so we could see what would happen.
 
If a CEO of a corporation says something really, really stupid, and the thing that he said will so damage the brand of that corporation that they will lose a great deal of money, the DUTY of the board of directors will be to replace him ASAP, that they can protect the brand and not lose a great deal of money.

They may be able to replace him, but they can not take his financial interests in the company, which is what the NBA is trying to do with Sterling.

Sterling said something that would cost the NBA a minimum of tens of millions of dollars in revenue - if they did not act quickly and decisively, then the public would have perceived their inaction as tacit tolerance of (if not agreement with) Sterling and his comments...and perception is everything.

In other words, the reason the other owners had to vote to take away the Clippers for him was to protect the revenue stream of all owners, because they all would have suffered significant losses as a direct result. Their actions, then, were their fiduciary DUTY as part of the group of owners of NBA teams.


1. I don't buy it... The NBA has a fantastic reputation for participating in and contributing to, programs that benefit kids and the over all well being of American society. One owner of one team does not tarnish the leagues reputation. Will it cost them, I'm sure it will, but not the 10's of millions that have been claimed.

2. Even if that were true, it still does not give anyone the right to force him to sell a business that legally owns, when he has committed no crime. This is not Russia, Cuba, Venezuela or North Korea, where there's no expectation of freedom or constitution protection of a persons private property.

You can't justify stripping someones business from them on the assumption that not doing so might have negative financial repercussions. That's not how America works... If the league in the future feels they have suffered significant financial loss, and attribute that loss to words or actions of Donald Sterling, our system provides a means for legal recourse. The league is free to file a civil suit against Sterling if they feel he is legally responsible for any financial loses they may suffer in the future, and a judge will determine is the league is entitled to compensation or not.

THAT'S HOW AMERICA WORKS.
 
Let's just remember, for all those who cite that Sterling signed an ownership agreement, that Al Davis signed a similar ownership agreement as owner of the Oakland, sometimes Los Angeles, Raiders. Part of his agreement was that he couldn't relocate his team without the consent of the other owners in the league - he signed that agreement - and yet, a court of law sided with him when he moved his team from Oakland to LA and then back again to Oakland. There was a similar occurrence, if I'm not mistaken, when Art Model moved the Cleveland Browns to Baltimore. In those cases, and others, the financial interests of the owners of the teams prevailed over arbitrary decisions made by the league's commissioner and other owners in the league. The same could easily be said for the NBA and its commissioner in this case.

I wish Sterling would take the league to court just so we could see what would happen.

Baseball gets away with prohibiting franchise moves because they have their anti-trust exemption. The NFL has no exemption, and Davis was able to argue that their restrictions violated his rights as a business owner to do business where he chose. A simplistic version, but pretty much it.

The others were able to do the same thing because Davis set the legal ability in place for them.

No other sports league enjoys the same level of control that MLB has over its teams.

If Sterling were to contest it in court, I'm not so sure he'd lose. The relevant portion of the league agreement is vague.
 
I don’t know. Did he do anything illegal? Did he break any laws? Has he discriminated against anyone? There is an old saying, “Actions speak louder than words.” Perhaps not in this case though. It does seem that Sterling has done everything in his power to make the Clippers a very competitive team and has rewarded his players regardless of race handsomely.

I really don’t know, I suppose if one places words over and above actions, yes. If not, then no. But as Brett Butler told Scarlet O’Hara, “Frankly my dear…..

This is very true, and let's also not forget that the league decided two years ago that Chris Paul could not be traded to the Los Angeles Lakers and forced the player into a trade that saw him go to that bastion of racism, the Clippers. And what did this black man do when he found himself banished to the Clippers, that bastion of racism, well he decided to sign a long term deal to play for Mr. Sterling, that most evil racist of all racists, apparently capable of destroying an entire league with a few comments.

So we have the league, apparently aware that Mr. Sterling has been an evil racist forever, and Chris Paul, a black man who can no doubt spot a racist miles away, both believing that Mr. Sterling's Clippers is a perfectly lovely place for a black basketball star to play.

This is nothing but a trumped up social media pile-on and it's pathetic.
 
I don’t know. Did he do anything illegal? Did he break any laws? Has he discriminated against anyone? There is an old saying, “Actions speak louder than words.” Perhaps not in this case though. It does seem that Sterling has done everything in his power to make the Clippers a very competitive team and has rewarded his players regardless of race handsomely.

1. No
2. No
3. To my knowledge, no.

I really don’t know, I suppose if one places words over and above actions, yes. If not, then no. But as Brett Butler told Scarlet O’Hara, “Frankly my dear…..

That seems to be the premise here... Unfortunately, we seem to be allowing political correctness to replace our rights and freedoms,
 
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