If you read my previous posts, Donald Sterling's comments made to his girlfriend were indefensible. Hell, even Sterling isn't defending them. The closest he came was, "She always referred to people as blacks and she wanted to bring blacks she found attractive to my game so I said don't bring blacks to my game because I was jealous." "Blacks" meant her attractive African-American friends and he said they can't come because he was jealous she found them attractive. I know they investigated if the tape was doctored. I know that I listened to the tape and she never claimed she was going to bring blacks to the game. I don't know if the investigation indicated if the tape was doctored or not so I can't say if Sterling's explanation is valid factually. All I know, is that they did indeed believe it to be the voice of Donald Sterling. Again, these are not refutable. Now for the punishment by Adam Silver.
Adam Silver did what most people have to do. You have to give into the mob, the NBA seemed to be ready to revolt if his punishment wasn't severe and they all applauded him for banning him for life, fining him the NBA maximum allowed, 2.5 million dollars, and suggesting the owners take away the team from him. I wasn't surprised that they threw the book at him but it is kind of redundant. Banning him for life I was okay with, the NBA is Adam Silver's organization and he can decide who comes and who doesn't to his shows. Interestingly though, why can't Donald Sterling do the same thing with his team? If he didn't want blacks to come to his game, that's his prerogative. I believe in private property and I've always been against others telling you who you can and can't have in your place of business. If you want to lose out on the revenue by blacks coming to the game, then I believe that to be a stupid business decision, but it's your business so be it. Just how I have no problem with Adam Silver banning Sterling from any sanctioned event. That makes more sense because Silver's not going to lose out on any business doing that.
Secondly, the $2.5 million I found asinine. Why would you pay that? He's already banned for life. What can they possibly do to him? I had a problem with this because White man guilt was playing it's card and he would have to pay just because nothing has changed and the public still likes watching pounds of flesh being taken. Hell if you hung Donald Sterling in the public square, I'm sure a crowd would gather just as it did in the Middle Ages. Sterling, however, saw the situation for what it was; pointless. His reputation is destroyed, he's got nothing to lose, so fight! Not only did he refuse to pay the fine, he sued the NBA for their right to do so. Good for him. Society keeps running their mouth that people are entitled to their opinion, but the second someone has an opinion the majority of people don't like, they crucify him. It takes more courage to say the things Margie Schott did than it does for Michael Sam to come out. I don't say Sterling because he made his comments in, what he believed to be, confidence.
Thirdly, they want to take the team away from him. Mark Cuban was the only guy to publicly say what I feel about this. He was worried about a slippery slope if we let the commissioner steal a team from you. Most people are like, "Well he's going to get paid" but that's not the point. Sales should not be made at the end of a gun barrel. A forced sale is anti-capitalistic and immoral. Just as I consider what Ben Roethlisberger did as rape when he locked himself in a bathroom with a woman as his offensive line stood guard. The woman told him "no" repeatedly, he just repeated back "It's okay." They then had sex. I don't count that as consensual; I count that as rape. If someone gives Sterling the millions he deserves for the Clippers, that is not a consensual transactions, therefore an invalid trade. With all that said, I saw the punishment as redundant. If the NBA has a little patience, they won't need an owner vote, Sterling would have to sell as a smart business decision. He's already lost sponsors. His players probably will boycott playing for him. Again, as a pro-capitalist, I'm anti-forced labor. If the players decide they don't want to accept his money to play for him, that is their right. I think Sterling will have trouble finding scab laborers. Basically, you need to find players that are really good at basketball and don't mind the public ridicule, vehement attacks and vitriolic hatred they will receive from playing for Sterling. This goes for players of any race. Good luck with that one. So, Sterling probably will have a team with no players. At best, they will be mediocre players who weren't good enough to make it to the NBA on their own so exchange the public hatred and endanger their lives, for their only shot to play in the NBA. Clippers will be the worst they have ever been and, given their history, that's saying something. The Clippers team would lose value, he will be funding it for no apparent reason and either he sells the team for a much lower price than he would get now, or he just pays millions of dollars for absolutely nothing. Those are Sterling's options. As for Shelly Sterling, I see no reason she shouldn't get the team. She didn't do anything. Why is everyone so mad at her? The only caveat to this is if the NBA is set up like a food chain. You can manage a McDonalds but you don't own McDonalds. I think the CEO of McDonalds could fire a manager if need be, so if teams work like individual franchises of a chain, then Adam Silver could kick him out but as that hasn't come up, I don't think that's the case.
One last thing about Shelly Sterling, I applaud her for filing to divorce her husband. I was bothered that the issue of Donald Sterling having a girlfriend when he has a wife never came out. It was Sterling the racist, not Sterling the adulterer. I will say Sterling the racist bigoted adulterer.
Autographed copies of my book The World Hasn't Progressed in 5,000 Years can be bought at the bottom of this page.
No comments:
Post a Comment