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Steve Ballmer goes nuts over 'hardcore' LA Clippers in fan festival Go hardcore! How former Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer plans to help his ailing LA Clippers basketball team
(about 3 hours later)
LA Clippers fans got a lot more than they bargained for as an emotional Steve Ballmer took the stage at the Staples Center to introduce himself as the new team owner. As the CEO of Microsoft, Steve Ballmer became known for delivering wildly enthusiastic corporate speeches that might have been better suited to a sports coach. Now, as the incoming owner of the beleaguered Los Angeles Clippers basketball team, he has found his new niche. During a Clippers rally at the Staples Centre in downtown Los Angeles on Monday, Mr Ballmer addressed fans with a pep-talk every bit as passionate as his famous Microsoft keynotes.
Set to Eminem's 'Lose Yourself' hit song, the former Microsoft chief executive made quite the entrance, high-fiving members of the audience and professing his love for the team and the city of Los Angeles at the top of his lungs in a 13-minute speech. One fan who has held a Clippers season ticket for 26 years asked Mr Ballmer what to expect from the team’s next quarter-century. The Clippers franchise, which began in 1970 as the Buffalo Braves, has never won the Larry O’Brien NBA Championship Trophy. According to the Los Angeles Times, Mr Ballmer responded by shouting: “I’ll boldly say that the Clippers will win many, many, many, many more Larrys in the next 26 [years] than in the last 26!”
"We are going to be hardcore, hardcore, hardcore! We're going to get better everyday. We're going to be tenacious. Something knocks us down and we're going to get back and keep coming and coming and coming and coming. Mr Ballmer left his role at Microsoft in February as the world’s 34th richest man, with an estimated fortune of approximately $20bn. He has said that owning a basketball team was a long-held ambition, and last week he finalised his purchase of the Clippers for $2bn (£1.2bn) – four times the previous record amount paid for an NBA franchise.
"Did you watch these guys? That was hardcore! Hardcore baby! Nothing gets in our way, Boom! Keep coming. Hardcore. The hardcore Clippers, that's us," he told the audience while the players, including Chris Paul, DeAndre Jordan and Blake Griffin, cheered on. The opportunity to buy the Clippers arose when their controversial previous owner, real estate mogul Donald Sterling, was banned by the NBA after a tape emerged of Mr Sterling making racist remarks to his then-girlfriend. Mr Sterling reluctantly relinquished the team in a court battle with his estranged wife Shelly Sterling, who sold the Clippers to Mr Ballmer on the condition that she retain certain perks – including the ceremonial title: “Owner Emeritus.”
"When he came through the crowd, I literally had goose bumps," Griffin told the AP after the presentation. "I don't know if there's one good word to describe him. I know all our guys are excited about the energy he brings. It's completely different." For many years, the Clippers have played in the shadow of the Los Angeles Lakers. Yet recently, thanks to the influence of head coach Doc Rivers and star players such as Chris Paul and Blake Griffin, they have risen higher in the standings than their hometown rivals.
Ballmer paid a record $2 billion for the team in a sale that was confirmed by a judge last week, putting an end to the Donald Sterling saga, who was banned from the NBA for life for making racist remarks in an explosive telephone conversation with former girlfriend V. Stiviano where he told her not associate herself with "black men" or bring them to the Clipper games. Those players, some of whom had threatened to strike if the Sterlings still owned the team at the start of the new season in October, grinned broadly as Mr Ballmer made his entrance at the  Staples Centre to the sound of Eminem’s Lose Yourself, high-fiving some of the 5,000 ecstatic fans as he went.
Earlier this month, Sterling lost a last-ditch attempt to block the sale of the team after a Los Angeles appeals court denied a request from his lawyers to overturn judge Michael Levanas’s ruling in which he affirmed Shelly Sterling's right to sell acting as the sole trustee of The Sterling Family Trust, which owns the Clippers. “When he came through the crowd, I literally had goose bumps,” Griffin said. “I know all our guys are excited about the energy he brings. It’s completely different.”
Mr Ballmer gave out his email address to the crowd – insisting they should call him Steve, not Mr Ballmer – before reading aloud a message he had received from a 26-year-old fan. “The Clippers are my heart and inspiration. Growing up in LA I had two choices. I always believed in the underdog, because I am one, so I picked the Clippers,” the unnamed fan wrote. “We know you’ll bring us LA underdogs a championship. Go Clippers!”
In one of the more heated passages of his 13-minute speech, Mr Ballmer promised the Clippers would be “hardcore”. He said: “Something knocks us down and we’re going to get back and keep coming and coming and coming and coming... Hardcore, baby! Nothing gets in our way, BOOM! Keep coming. Hardcore. The hardcore Clippers, that’s us.”
Mr Ballmer spent his 34-year career with Microsoft living in Seattle. There had been speculation that he might move the team north to his hometown, which currently lacks an NBA franchise; he quashed that notion.
Mr Ballmer’s mantra at Microsoft used to be: “I love this company!” On Monday, he offered some alternatives: “I love basketball!... I love Los Angeles!... I love this team!” For now at least, the team and its fans love him too.