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Originally Posted by TripleDipping
Sterling's not going to just give up on ownership just like that. I wouldn't be surprised if he fights this all the way.
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You may be right. But I'd point out that Sterling is 80 now, not 50. Some of that Fighting Lawyer spirit just may not be there anymore. And he will no longer have his favorite status symbol (the Clippers), around which he's said to've anchored much of his social life. Yeah, he'll still have acquaintances and hangers-on, because billionaires don't have to be lonely. But I suspect that for a lot of social A-listers (or D-listers even), an evening at the court of Donald Sterling isn't going to carry the same cachet it once did.
Also, safe to say that he is no longer enjoying the comfort and companionship of Ms. Stiviano as he has for the last 4 years, and again, as Sterling made clear to her, he can find another girl, or more precisely, he can find a girl to do what he wants. But somehow I suspect that age 80, variety isn't the novelty it used to be, and that familiarity is the bigger comfort.
What's more, Sterling lost his youngest son (from whom he had reportedly been estranged) to a drug overdose a year and a half ago. His wife of 60 years (from whom he's been estranged for the last several years) may finally be ready to divide assets and move on, and distance herself from a man who has humiliated her and her family. Sterling's surviving children are almost certainly embarrassed and sickened both by the emergence of the tapes, and likely angered by the way he has treated their mother for the last several years, with his public carryings-on with women 50 years younger. His son-in-law has already publically decried Sterling's comments on the tapes.
All of which is to say, Sterling may find himself a social pariah, isolated from family and friends who don't want to be associated with his now public attitudes on race. Most of the people who will be around him on a day-to-day basis will be people whom he's paying, and while he may already be long-accustomed to that, at some point, seeds of doubt begin to sprout.
Again, he's 80 now, not 50. Some of that Warrior Lawyer spirit may've been blunted off with time. And in a protracted legal battle (or multiple battles if his wife finally presses for divorce), time may no longer be on Sterling's side. So the question is 'fight this all the way to where?'. If it's a fight to the death, the NBA may be able to wait him out.
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Originally Posted by Variant
Someone mentioned the gay marriage thing earlier. Society is slowly tilting towards accepting gay marriage. Could an owner who speaks out against it privately be forced to sell based on the same reasoning for forcing Sterling to sell? Maybe not now, but what about when there's enough popular outcry? What's the threshold?
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When the league is 80% homosexual, it will definitely be a concern.