Los Angeles Clippers could sell for $2 billion dollars
By Bryan Rose
As more and more bidders emerge for the Los Angeles Clippers, the price of the franchise continues to skyrocket and ESPN’s Bill Simmons believes the price could raise upwards of $2 billion dollars if the sale goes into an auction format.
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Regardless, Simmons says the floor for a sale is now at $1.8 billion dollars, a far cry from the $12.5 million dollars Donald Sterling paid for the franchise back in 1981.
The team was recently said to be worth $575 million dollars by Forbes magazine, though, those numbers tend to be more focused on assets as just last year, the Sacramento Kings (one of the NBA’s smallest markets) sold for $535 million dollars, a then record for the NBA.
Since then, the Milwaukee Bucks, who very well could be the NBA’s smallest market sold for an even higher price.
It’s rather rare for any NBA team to be placed on the market for sale, let alone one in a large market. But when you’re talking one of the league’s biggest markets like Los Angeles? It’s essentially an unprecedented situation.
No, the Clippers aren’t the Lakers in terms of popularity and they may always be the ‘ugly sister’ but as we’ve seen with the Clippers in recent years, if you build a winner the fans and profit will come along with that.
At least six serious bidding groups are said to have significant interest in purchasing the Clippers organization with more expected, so there isn’t expected to be any shortage of suitors (or money) come the sale.