NBA-ийн мөрдөн байцаалтаар Лос Анжелес Клипперс баг Кавай Леонардтай холбоотой гэрээгээр цалингийн хязгаар зөрчсөн нь тогтоогдож, түүхэн дэх хамгийн том шийтгэлийг хүлээгээд байна.
NBA-ийн зүгээс Лос Анжелес Клипперс багийг Кавай Леонардын төлөө олон сая долларын нэмэлт урамшууллын гэрээг бусад компаниудтай хууль бусаар байгуулж, цалингийн хязгаар зөрчсөн гэж үзэн шийтгэл ногдууллаа. Энэхүү үйл явдал нь багийн хөгжөөн дэмжигчдийн хувьд урьд өмнө тохиолдож байсан олон таагүй үйл явдлуудын нэгэн адил сэтгэл гонсойлгосон үйл явдал болж байна.
Клипперс багийн зүгээс NBA-ийн энэхүү дүгнэлтийг эрс үгүйсгэж, мөрдөн байцаалтыг нэг талыг барьсан гэж мэдэгджээ. Багийн удирдлага өөрсдийн гэм буруугүй гэдгийг нотлохын тулд арбитрын шүүхэд хандах зэрэг боломжтой бүх арга замыг ашиглахаар төлөвлөж байна. Гэсэн хэдий ч багийн энэхүү шийдвэр нь хөгжөөн дэмжигчдэд тайвшрал авчрахгүй байгаа бөгөөд тэдний зарим нь багийн удирдлага болон Кавай Леонардын үйлдэлд сэтгэл дундуур байгаагаа илэрхийлэв.
Энэхүү дуулиан нь Кавай Леонардын багтай байгуулсан гэрээ болон түүнийг явах үед үүсэх шийтгэлүүдтэй холбоотойгоор багийн нэр хүндэд томоохон цохилт боллоо. Одоогийн байдлаар Лос Анжелес Клипперс болон Торонто Рэпторс багуудын хооронд хийгдэхээр төлөвлөгдсөн байсан солилцоог мөрдөн байцаалтын улмаас түр зогсоогоод байна. Хөгжөөн дэмжигчид уг асуудал эцэслэгдэж, багийн ирээдүйн талаар тодорхой шийдвэр гарахыг хүлээж байна.
Дэлгэрэнгүй эх сурвалжийг харах
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As actor Paul Scheer’s phone buzzed Wednesday afternoon, the messages let him know he’d been cast in a part he knew exactly how to play.
His role? Embarrassed Clippers fan.
Scheer, best known for starring in FX’s “The League” and Showtime’s “Black Monday,” had moved to Los Angeles in need of a team to get behind. The city’s best Bad News Bears story appealed to him. The end of the Donald Sterling era featured the most talented rosters in Clippers history, and the energy from new owner Steve Ballmer had him all in for the other team in town.
But as news broke Wednesday afternoon that the NBA had found the Clippers guilty of salary cap circumvention with Kawhi Leonard, text after text reminded him of his fandom fate.
“You just feel that they will always be the laughingstock,” Scheer told The Athletic on Thursday. “And as a fan, you’re always fighting that. You remind people they have the (active 15-season) streak of winning seasons.
“And then something happens.”
Something happened when, according to a year-long investigation by the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, the team improperly brokered multi-million dollar endorsement deals with multiple companies for Leonard. Something, of course, always seems to happen.
Something happened when Sports Illustrated called the Clippers the “worst sports franchise ever” on its cover in 2000. Something happened when Blake Griffin stepped on Lamar Odom’s ankle during a playoff practice and could hardly move for the rest of the 2013 postseason. Something happened when Donald Sterling’s racist rants were released in the middle of the 2014 playoff run. Something happened when Josh Smith and Corey Brewer took turns as the Splash Brothers in a Game 6 the year after. Something happened when Chris Paul got his hand caught in a Portland Trail Blazers player’s jersey, ending the 2016 playoff run with a broken bone. Something happened when the Clippers included a lanky rookie point guard named Shai Gilgeous-Alexander in a trade for Paul George. Something happened when Lou Williams broke COVID-19 protocols at Magic City in 2020.
And something happened last fall when the “Pablo Torre Finds Out” podcast published its first episode alleging that the Clippers’ broke NBA salary cap rules by getting Leonard an endorsement contract with the now-bankrupt environmental company Aspiration.
“Every five or six years, something massive happens that sets back that franchise,” Scheer said. “Being a Clippers fan is high highs, and then the lowest of lows.”
“This is the largest punishment in the history of the NBA.”
The Clippers, for their part, continue to say they’ve done nothing wrong, though the league’s collective bargaining agreement doesn’t provide a pathway for the franchise to appeal or seek arbitration within the league.
“We vehemently reject the NBA’s findings, which are the result of a heavily biased investigation seeking to justify a predetermined narrative rather than facts and evidence. What the league told us privately differs from what it announced today publicly, and they have not held themselves close to the standard Commissioner (Adam) Silver set at the start of this investigation to ensure it’s fairness and accuracy,” the team said in a statement Wednesday. “For the past year, we cooperated fully and in good faith and we will now fight just as hard to demonstrate our innocence. We intend to vigorously challenge these findings and penalties through every avenue available to us and look forward to an ethical and impartial arbitration process.”
The franchise’s resolve has been little comfort to many fans who feel this latest indignity is just another chapter in the book of Clippers, and more ammunition for their friends and rivals.
“Being a Clippers fan, you have to deal with the negativity of being a fan in the Los Angeles market with the other team (Lakers), and the other fan base, that loves to rub their banners and championships in your face,” Jason Beresford, a Clippers fan from Inglewood, said. “You’re trying to get to at least one of those, and you’ve got to deal with the negativity, you got to deal with the jokes, you got to deal with the disrespect. And now, this is now something else you have to deal with.”
Some of the frustration, according to the fans who spoke with The Athletic in the aftermath of the punishment, stems from the standards they thought the Clippers were building. From the top-tier practice facility, to a state-of-the-art arena, to fan-forward initiatives, there was a sense the organization was rewarding the people most loyal to the team. These cap circumvention violations threaten that.
“I feel really hurt and betrayed, kind of by our front office and Steve. I’m never going to disrespect Steve because of what he’s done for the franchise and what he’s done for all the fans, Intuit, and you know, the stuff he does and shows other sports owners how it’s done,” Clippers fan and content creator Darian Vaziri said. “But he messed up on this, and I genuinely believe Steve, Lawrence Frank, and (president of business operations) Gillian (Zucker) lied. It sets a whole hurdle about this shady stuff that they were doing.
“It just makes me feel slighted as a fan because Gillian and Lawrence Frank and these people, at the end of the day, this LA Clippers thing is bigger than them. It’s bigger than any player, it’s bigger than any owner. It represents a level of the people, the supporters, that have been loyal longer than any of these guys have been involved. Now we have to feel the pain.”
The star at the center of the scandal has their ire too. Not only did Leonard’s signing in 2019 come with a trade that cost them reigning two-time NBA Most Valuable Player Gilgeous-Alexander, it comes with penalties on his way out the door.
“Obbviously I’m looking at Kawhi too. Kawhi is my favorite player,” singer Courtney Jaye said. “He is the reason why I am a Clipper fan. So this is devastating for me on that level. But also, you know, I just … it’s the front office that I’m just truly, you know, I’m just very disappointed, and a little disgusted, too.
“… I’m frustrated, too, that Kawhi gets to kind of wash his hands and just leave, and I just think that the fans are the ones getting completely screwed. It was hard enough to be a Clipper fan in the first place, and now they’ve made it virtually impossible.”
So what comes next? There’s no unified idea.
“I’m still 24 hours fresh, and time heals a lot of things,” longtime Clippers fan Ricky Chu said. “But right now, I know a lot of people that just want to support the team. I see people that want Ballmer to sell the team. I see people that don’t want to renew their tickets. And there’s a lot. And I think every person’s opinion is fair.”
Clippers fans, for now, can exhale. They know their team will be punished. They know their star player will be gone, assuming the Clippers and Toronto Raptors finalize the trade that was put on hold due to the league’s investigation. They know the Clippers’ reputation has been damaged.
Now, it’s back to usual.
“There was a relief in seeing how it went down because it’s like, ‘Thank god it’s over at least,” Scheer said. “And now I can guess my expectations can be tempered.”
“We’ve all been here for a very long time. We survived Donald Sterling,” Erica O’Keith added. “… I’m like, ‘All right, well, cool. Let’s move on.’
“I’ll be at the Dome in October.”
“Pablo Torre Finds Out” is produced by Meadowlark Media and became part ofThe AthleticPodcast Network last September through a licensing deal.
