OT: Steve Ballmer buys the Clippers for $2 Billion
and is considering renaming the team...
... or maybe not ???
Clippy says "Go Clippers!"
All for just $2 Billion. $2 Billion???
http://espn.go.com/los-angeles/nba/story/_/id/11003237/former-microsoft…
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Thats a big boss
That just seems like a crazy amount of money for a historically bad franchise that plays second fiddle to the Lakers in L.A.
It doesn't matter if they're bad. In baseball and basketball, low payrolls, corporate sponsors and TV deals make even the worst teams extremely profitable.
You don't make your money back in 5 years, that doesn't make it a bad investment.
In two years the Clippers TV deal will be up, and the national TV deal will be up as well. They'll make at least 100 million a year off their local TV deal, and another 50 or more when the national deal is be renewed.
All this extra money coming in and play salary going down after the lockout, and these teams are starting to make money.
Baseball and basketball have huge local TV deals, with specialty networks that bring in huge lumps of cash. That's how the Astros made 100 million dollars last year. It's possible if you can land that TV contract.
you are thiniking about this the right way. As long as he can SELL the team for the same amount of money that he buys them for, he hasn't lost any money. Any money he is making from year-to-year operation is just pure profit. You don't need to "make back your capital investment" with profit if the value of your investment hasn't gone down.
He only loses money on the deal if he goes to sell the team and the team has lost value, therefore requiring him to sell them for less than he purchased them for (which IS possible given the massive amount he is paying). Any profit he makes from year-to-year operations is gravy. The main investment is the overall value of the team.
Think of it like a dividend stock. The year-to-year profit of the team is just the dividend. The value of the team is the stock and is his real investment. For most pro teams in good leagues, as long as they are breaking even every year, or breaking even over time, the owners are still making out like bandits because the value of the franchise is going way up over time.
Now, will anyone else ever pay 2 billion for the Clippers? Dunno. Obviously Ballmer thinks so, or doesn't care.
They were historically bad because they had a cheapskate owner, horrible luck with injuries and poor drafting. Now they have CP3 and Blake in the #2 largest market in the country and the NBA is a global enterprise, and their next TV rights deal could be enormous. I'm not saying it's a wise investment, I just wouldn't use historical context to judge the deal. Grantland has a lengthy piece on the sale that I recommend reading.
He will move the team. Easy solution.
like a guy diving on a bar tab, that guy jumped in front of me at the $2BB checkout lane. darn. maybe next time...
Glad that's over. Why would he rename the team? I kind of like it.
But "The Developers" would be a cool name.
How about the "Alt-Ctrl-Deletes"?
the Blue Screen of Death for Chris Paul
Ballmer stuck around long enough at Microsoft to become the richest useless employee in the country, and walked away with $20 billion. It's play money, he's looking for something to do.
Richest useless employee? My professional goals just changed.
for the Clippers. Suppose in 10 years, they're only worth $400MM versus the $2,000MM he paid for them.
Big deal! That's still less than 10% of his current net worth lost, and he gets the fun of being an NBA owner in Los Angeles in the meantime.
to have so much money that you can greatly overpay for a shiny new toy.
Who on this board hasn't overpaid for an overrated underperforming NBA franchise?
That's what I thought. Hypocrites.
I think it would be funny if, the first time he saw the scoreboard, it read:
... never seen an overpriced acquisition he didn't like...
Sterling's lawyer just said that he will sue the NBA for $1bn. Also, the deal was signed with the idea that Sterling was mentally incapacitated. I'm sure him and his lawyer will also challenge that ruling.
Also...I don't have enough points to post but interesting contract extension for RichRod. He is given shares that will vest for 8 years if he remains coach. Has the potential to make him the highest paid CFB coach depending on how the market does:
http://footballscoop.com/news/13647-coach-contract-equity
West Virginia
like Sterling who in addition to being a huge bigot, and was also one of the worst owners in all of pro sports for decades, gets rewarded with a huge payday like this. No justice here. As for Ballmer, he must not care at all about making money on his investment. It will take him longer to get his $2 billion back than the time he has left on Earth.
I dont't think Ballmer cares about whether he makes his initial investment back or not. He just wants to have fun. And what is more fun than owning a sports team in LA?
$2 billion to him is like $25,000 to most people. He's got plenty more.
The Clippers will be in Seattle with 5-years with a new stadium. Could be a good investment.
then why all of the strikes and lockouts in all of the major sports?
Not sure what Arizona sees. He's a lot better than what they've had but they've still gone 8-5 the last few years with a below average defense.
we've gone two years without scoring a TD against our in state rival and gone 8-5 and 7-6. Throw in two bowl wins for Arizona and two bowl loses for us.... Not to mention they have wins over USC and Oregon the last two years.
The
Dynamite
Is 8-5 and 8-5 really much different than 8-5 and 7-6. Plus ASU throttled them both years. They did beat USC once by 3 points when USC went 7-6. Beating Nevada and Boston college in bowl games is a lot easier than South Carolina and KSU.
our two biggest conference wins are against a 6-6 OSU and a 6-6 MSU. they may have gotten throttled by ASU, but they also throttled a top 5 Oregon team.
So you think that two 8-5 seasons should qualify for the highest paid coach in the country? You said that they've done better in beating their instate rival which is untrue. They did beat oregon but besides that them and us have had almost indentical years these past two years. If we get that two point conversion against Ohio I'd say that we did better.
Part of me says of course. Ballmer wanted to move the Kings to Seattle. The league would approve of the move to give the franchise a fresh start. I know the rename them thing was a joke, but why not bring them back to Seattle and call them the Sonics? The Cleveland Browns exist as a precedence.
Part of me says no way. Why would he instantly cut $1B from the team valuation by moving out of the LA market? Also, the NBA would appear to be cruel to the few Clippers fans by moving them after their draconian owner was finally expunged.
1. After being there for this long, the NBA wants 2 teams in LA and will never approve this.
2. Any sale agreement likely includes "will not move team" language considering it was well known that he wanted to move the Kings to Seattle further making it harder for him to do so in the future.