The NBA just dropped a nuke. They were aiming at the Los Angeles Clippers... but they have hit themselves instead.
A couple of hours ago, I read that the NBA had fined the Los Angeles Clippers $50 million, suspended their _owner _for one year, and took away FIVE first round draft picks. Not only is it the biggest punishment in NBA history, it is the biggest punishment in the history of professional sports... unless you count forcing the racist bag of shit previous owner of the Clippers to sell the team... and make billions of dollars in profit (what a punishment!).
If you haven't been following, the crime the Clippers were found "guilty" of was circumventing the salary cap to funnel a few extra million dollars to Kawhi Leonard for playing in less than half his team's games and for winning a whopping 17 playoff games over five years. I mean signing Kawhi was enough punishment in itself but the NBA did the NBA thing and did something really stupid.
My initial reaction was thinking that the NBA had just nuked the LA Clippers. I began to feel for their fans who had done nothing wrong... except root for the LA Clippers. They are really the ones who would be punished. Kawhi got a $700k slap on the wrist. Owner Steve Balmer is still going to be one of the ten richest billionaires in the world regardless of what the NBA does. So the real victims are the fans... as always.
But then I read the letter from the Clippers' legal team and realized that it is not the Clippers who are super fucked. It is the NBA. First Balmer is one of the ten richest people in the world. He's not just going to take this punishment quietly. he has already spent FIFTY MILLION DOLLARS defending himself. (What a great use of $50 million. I can think of a bunch of really great charities who could use that money... but no. Let's give it to the lawyers.) He's going to fight the biggest punishment in the history of sports with everything he's got.... which is a lot.
And this is where I think the NBA may have killed themselves with friendly fire. Balmer is being punished by the NBA for circumventing a SALARY CAP. And that is a problem. I won't even get into the he said/he said of whether or not the Clippers actually broke the rules. that is boring and I don't care. If this goes to court, I would imagine Balmer's legal team will bring up the fact that a salary cap is illegal. If sports leagues were any other business, they would be severely punished for colluding to set the price of an input. That is illegal. All the shoe companies in America cannot get together and collude to only pay 1 cent for 1 square foot of leather. All of the jewelry manufactures cannot collude to only pay $1 per ounce of gold. That is illegal. And yet professional sports teams are able to join together and say they will set a limit on how much they will spend on the input that drives their profits... athletic talent.
It would be illegal in any other business. Did that explain it?
I would imagine Balmer's legal team will argue that Balmer cannot break a rule based on an illegal practice. Technically, thanks to Baseball's anti-trust exemption status, sports teams are exempt from following this law. That decision was made back in 1922 when baseball was a multi thousand dollar business... and the NBA didn't even exist. Sports are now a multi trillion dollar business.
The NBA better be careful before they force a court to side with an owner who broke a rule by PAYING AN EMPLOYEE WHAT HE THOUGHT HE WAS WORTH. Let that sink in. That is the horrible crime that has allegedly been committed here. Even if Balmer is guilty, he is guilty of paying employees what he thinks their real market value is. Imagine if someone said your boss couldn't give you a raise. It is simply absurd.
Good luck NBA. You may have just opened Pandora's box to paying NBA players what they are actually worth.
