The LA Clippers of Inglewood... Maybe
The Los Angeles Clippers are tired of being the second basketball team in LA. Yes, they have been the better team in recent memory, but the Lakers (despite a lot of losing) continue to be the city’s favorite, and Staples Center is still the house that Shaq built.
The nearly 17-year-old arena is decorated with 16 Laker championship banners and 9 retired jerseys (plus Chick Hearn's jersey and that counts right?) The Clippers have a total of zero, and it has to be a somewhat annoying reminder for fans to see these gigantic cover-ups (pictured below) at home games. Not to mention the gigantic statues outside of Staples Center honoring a number of Laker Legends; again, no Clippers are represented. The Clipper front office feels like Staples Center isn't their home; it's the Lakers'. That doesn't seem likely to change anytime soon, so they had to look at what else was possible.
Each home game, the Lakers' championship banners are covered by images of Clipper players.
On June 15 the Clippers made a potentially historic announcement about their future in Downtown LA. Their basic message was this: If you don’t want us, then screw it—we’re out.
The team announced that after nearly two decades of riding shotgun to the purple-and-gold, they will aim to take their talents elsewhere—specifically about 5 miles down the 110 South, to Inglewood. An NBA team hasn’t played a game in the city since 1999, the last season the Lakers played their home games in the Forum.
Inglewood is also the soon-to-be home of two NFL teams: the Rams and Chargers, who will play in the all-new Los Angeles Stadium at Hollywood Park in 2020. That stadium is currently being built at 3900 W. Manchester Blvd., just a 5 minute drive from the location of the Clippers would-be home on the corner of Century and Prairie. Like the Rams and Steve Kroenke, the Clippers’ new home would be paid for by their multibillionaire owner, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer.
Construction on an NFL Stadium in Inglewood is already underway.
Ballmer (not the taxpayer, hooray!) plans to privately fund the development and construction of the complex, which is to contain multiple facilities, parking and, of course, the new arena. He’s already dropped $1.5 million getting the green light from the city to plan and design his team’s state-of-the-art facility. Ballmer (estimated at $31.8 billion) probably considers spending $1.5 million the way I would consider adding fries to my meal or not, but he would not make this move if he didn’t believe there was a good chance of a positive outcome.
So that’s it. The Clips are heading to the ‘Wood… right?
Wrong.
Although the team said that it would immediately start developing the arena’s plans, there is no commitment on either side to actually build one. The Clippers and the city of Inglewood have entered a 3-year ENA—exclusive negotiating agreement—but that’s only a commitment to draw out plans and continue discussing the possibility of moving the team.
ClipsNation may have defined the ENA best calling it a ‘three-year-long first date’ between the two sides. This makes sense considering the fact that the Clippers’ contract with Staples Center does not expire until 2024, and a buyout would cost Ballmer millions of dollars that he would much rather put into the team’s home floor of the future. Think of the contract as a prenuptial agreement between the Clippers and Staples Center. If the Clippers can stick it out, the divorce will go a whole lot smoother.
Clipper owner Steve Ballmer, who has committed to fund the team's new arena.
On top of the years of filing and petitioning that go into actually getting something like this built, the Clippers learned of another obstacle when The Forum (one of LA’s premiere concert venues and the old home of the Lakers) released a two-page letter on June 16 detailing their opposition to the proposed move. The Inglewood venue, which has helped stimulate Inglewood's economy, accused the city of "backroom dealing" and violating “numerous agreements and requirements of law.” It is not yet clear what legal action they could seek, but any mount is not good news for the Clippers and their fans.
For now, all we can do is sit back and ‘let the adults talk it out’ so to speak. Local politics will play a major role in the discussions to come, as well as other factors such as environmental effects, economic impact and (hopefully) whether or not the people of Inglewood actually want two ginormous sport complexes within 2 miles of each other. It’s good for business, but is it good for people?
