
Steve Ballmer to buy LA Clippers for $2 billion - aaronbrethorst
http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-sn-clippers-sale-ballmer-20140529-story.html
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pud
He should rename them to the LA Clippys.

(I know I'm risking downvotes by posting this. But c'mon.)

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eddieroger
Hi there! It looks like you're trying to play basketball.

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hkmurakami
Hahaha let me buy you a drink sometime for this comment. It seriously made my
day.

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Eduardo3rd
If the Clippers are worth $2 billion I can't even imagine what the Bulls,
Lakers, or Heat would cost on the open market. I wonder if the increase in
value over the past few decades relates to the fact that live sporting events
drive such a huge premium in today's consume at your own pace media culture.

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MisterBastahrd
Lakers? More. Others? Not as much. The only other NBA team worth that kinda
scratch is the Knicks. Ballmer WAY overpaid for a second tier team that
happened to be in a prime market. He should seriously consider renaming and
rebranding it as soon as possible.

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eddieroger
The Heat are the reigning dynasty with three of the best players in the league
on one team surrounded by an all-star cast. They'd at least tie the Lakers in
cost. But yeah, the Clippers are second-tier relative to some of the talent
out there, I agree with that.

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MisterBastahrd
The Lakers have a ton of championships that have gotten them a MASSIVE
following and they're in the largest market in the country. The Heat are
nowhere remotely close to being as valuable. This isn't a matter of talent,
it's a matter of history, brand loyalty, advertising, and all the money that
comes with that.

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fataliss
Damn, I think it's one of the best return on investment in the sport industry!
As the owner of the team do you get any share of the derived products? I bet
it can be quite a nice amount if so, probably nothing compared to the TV
contracts though. Question is, can the Clippers generate more than 2B for
Steve? Is it a pure buzz/fame investment or real money making machine?

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nlh
What's remarkable about this whole affair is that when all is said and done,
one can step back and see the following:

A guy bought an NBA team for $12.5 million in 1981, made some horribly racist
remarks in 2014, and then realized a 160x return on his investment because of
those remarks and the attention they brought to the team.

Quite a world we live in, eh?

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jhonovich
It's a 16.6% CAGR - very good, but less astronomical than looking at simply
the multiple of the original purchase amount.

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simulate
16.6% CAGR over 33 years _is_ astronomical. Apple, one of the most successful
corporations in history, has achieved an 18.95% CAGR since its launch in 1984.
$100,000 invested in Apple in 1984 yields $18 million today. You can play with
that here:
[http://forio.com/contour/examples/investment/investment.html](http://forio.com/contour/examples/investment/investment.html)

Achieving a double digit CAGR over multiple decades is extremely rare.

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fivedogit
"Get on your feet" should be played with the lineups before each game.

Seriously, though, content is being bifurcated into "live, can't find/steal
online" and everything else. The former is apparently worth a lot these days.

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dylan_george
DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS! DEVELOPERS!

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schultkl
DRIBBLERS! DRIBBLERS! DRIBBLERS! DRIBBLERS! DRIBBLERS! haha ; o )

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sitkack
What an abject waste of money.

