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  1. FROM ABOVE ARTICLE:

    Are the Clippers about to get sunk?

    A true story from Sunday afternoon inside the $2 billion house that Steve Ballmer built (Intuit Dome): I’m using one of the many urinals that the LA Clippers owner is so proud of — there are more than 1,400 toilets in all, if you hadn’t heard — when his booming voice comes through the speakers with a mildly uncomfortable message for those of us in the men’s room.

    “We love No. 2!” Ballmer bellowed as he addressed the All-Star game crowd before tipoff.

    Get your mind out of the gutter: He was talking about Kawhi Leonard.

    Yet with everything that has transpired in Clippers land these past five months, from the early September Pablo Torre podcast that detailed salary cap circumvention allegations surrounding Leonard to the league launching its investigation a few days later until now, the kumbaya vibe between this owner and this star player was quite a sight to see. Especially considering what might come next.

    In the weeks leading up to Ballmer’s big bash, there was a significant upswing in league-wide speculation that the NBA’s hammer is likely to fall on the Clippers. This was a noticeable shift from earlier in the season, when so many seemed to believe that the Leonard/Aspiration scandal might come and go without any substantive punishment being handed down.

    There’s still no official resolution on this front; NBA commissioner Adam Silver indicated on Saturday that the results weren’t yet in from the investigation.

    “I haven’t come to any decisions whatsoever yet on the Clippers’ matter,” he told reporters during his media availability. “As you know, the league office is not directly running the investigation. That’s being overseen by a law firm, Wachtell, in New York. From everything I’ve been told, the Clippers have been fully cooperative. But as I said, I’m not involved day-to-day in the investigation.

    ”I think, as I’ve said before, it’s enormously complex. You have a company in bankruptcy (Aspiration, which gave Leonard a no-show endorsement deal that was allegedly facilitated by the Clippers). You have thousands of documents, multiple witnesses that have been needed to be interviewed. I will say, just in case anyone is wondering, the fact that All-Star is here this weekend has had no impact on the timeline of the investigation. Our charge to the Wachtell law firm is (to) do the work and then come back and make recommendations to the league office, and that’s where things now stand.”

    For the past two decades, when the NBA has needed a sensitive issue investigated, it’s repeatedly called on the same law firm.

    That last part about the timing of it all is worth unpacking, as there has been chatter among rival teams for months now that the league was delaying its announcement for the sake of salvaging All-Star Weekend. Yet until the ruling comes, the Clippers’ every move will continue to be analyzed by league folks and fans alike.

    Did they give president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank a lucrative and lengthy extension months ago as a preemptive battening of the hatches? Was the Ivica Zubac deal with the Indiana Pacers perhaps motivated by the desire to secure first-round draft picks in case the Clippers have to forfeit draft picks? Did James Harden want to get out of Dodge, err, Inglewood (and off to the Cleveland Cavaliers) in part because of the chaos that might be coming around the bend? This is the sort of stuff that has been bandied about for some time now, and which will be interesting to revisit when clarity finally comes.

    As for the actual basketball, the Clippers have done a remarkable job turning things around despite all the distractions (I didn’t even mention the unflattering Chris Paul exile). Since Dec. 20 — when they were an embarrassing 6-21 — they’ve won 20 of 27 games while posting a net rating of 5.6 that is seventh in the league. It remains unclear when newcomer Darius Garland (who came to the Clippers from Cleveland) will make his debut, as he’s continuing to recover from the left toe injury that required surgery in the offseason (he hasn’t played since Jan. 14). Our Law Murray reported on Wednesday that Garland isn’t expected to play until March.

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