Former Microsoft CEO to Buy L.A. Clippers for $2 Billion

Former Microsoft chief Steve Ballmer has reportedly won an intense bidding war to buy the Los Angeles Clippers from disgraced owner Donald Sterling for $2 billion.

The figure is nearly four times greater than the $550 billion the Milwaukee Bucks sold for earlier this month, which at the time was a record sum for the sale of an NBA franchise.

According to the Los Angeles Times, other bidders included L.A.-based investors Tony Ressler and Steve Karsh as well as a group led by David Geffen and executives from the Guggenheim Group, which owns the L.A. Dodgers.

As per an agreement with the league, the sale was handled by Shelly Sterling, the wife of Donald Sterling, who was banned for life from the NBA after he was caught on tape making racist comments.

One other wrinkle in this story is that fact that Ballmer lives in Seattle, which lost its Supersonics team after the 2007-2008 season when the franchise relocated to Oklahoma City and was renamed the Thunder. But Ballmer’s victory does not mean the Clippers will be moving to his home city.

Two weeks ago, he told The Wall Street Journal, “If I get interested in the Clippers, it would be for Los Angeles. I don’t work anymore, so I have more geographic flexibility than I did a year, year-and-a half ago. Moving them anywhere else would be value destructive.”

[Photo via Wikimedia Commons]

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