"Controversy won't sink Clippers' finances"

From cnn. Looks like getting him to sell is going to be very difficult as the Clippers make him money every year, are profitable, and the sponsors are going to have to pay up regardless.

Also, I personally do not see 22 owners voting to force him to sell. Many of them have their own skeletons and it is a very dangerous precedent - piss off your peers and they take away your toys.

LINK

quote:

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But all of this will likely mean relatively little for the finances of the team and Sterling himself, at least for now.

First, while a dozen sponsors have ended or suspended sponsorship deals, it's not clear how many have stopped making payments to the team.

Sports marketing consultant Marc Ganis said it's likely most of the contracts do not allow sponsors to stop paying out solely because of comments by Sterling or similar controversies.

"They don't want to be connected with a brand as reviled as the Clippers brand is at the moment," said Ganis. "But they still may be required to make payments by the existing contracts."

And some sponsors may return to the team if the NBA suspends Sterling, Ganis said.

Related: 12 Clippers sponsors jump ship

Second, even if the Clippers take a revenue hit, the team is well positioned to stay profitable.

The team already turns a healthy profit on relatively low revenue, according to sports business experts.

According to the most recent estimates by Forbes, a leading source of data on the finances of professional sports teams, the Clippers brought in $128 million in annual revenue. That places the team's revenue near the bottom among the NBA's 30 teams. But the Clippers still turned a $15 million profit, Forbes estimates.

"This is a team that historically had low revenue and low attendance, and made money in spite of that," said Ganis.

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