#Oprah to own the Clippers?

Getty Images photo via ESPN

Per ESPN, it's possible.

Oprah Winfrey, David Geffen and Larry Ellison will join together in a bid to buy the Los Angeles Clippers if the NBA's board of governors votes to force Donald Sterling to sell the team, Geffen told ESPN's Jeremy Schaap on Wednesday.

Now, you might say, what about the Magic Johnson proposal, or others?

The NFL is the only league that officially opposes cross-league ownership, so it's possible, on Magic. I still think that, at a minimum, they'd try to force him to become part of Oprah's team, with or without his other partners from the Dodgers.

Oprah, even as a "face" owner only, adds to things as a woman as well as minority. And, her plus Geffen on the entertainment side? In LA? With the Clips now the top dog team there and set to build on that? Magic's Guggenheim group with the Dodgers just can't match that.

Would Shaquille O'Neal find a way out of his sliver of Sacramento Kings ownership to try to put together a deal? If nothing else, to taunt Kobe Bryant over at the Lakers? That, I doubt.

Also, since Geffen had reportedly tried to buy the Clippers before, I think the league would give them first shot for that reason, too.

As for Magic, I'll take him at his word about being interested in the NFL in LA. That said, per what I noted above, he'll have to leave the Dodgers if he does.

Yeah, Sean Combs is also interested. I think Oprah's wattage is brighter.

As for other possibles? I'm sure that, of two boxers reportedly interested, the NBA will take a pass on Floyd Mayweather Jr. That said, if the Oprah team could also find a sliver of room for Oscar de la Hoya, both Hispanic and an L.A. native, that would be icing on the cake for them.

Meanwhile, could there be backlash? Is this in a sense another Brendan Eich incident, in that it will provoke a lot of second guessing? I don't think so, and it shouldn't, no more than Mozilla's action on Eich, and the push for it to act, should have, even though it did. Jason Whitlock says we should all be careful, at least, and that we should make sure this is about all people, not just "black people." And, none of us is ever going to be perfect, speaking as a white male. But, we can all work on improving both public stances and private thoughts and attitudes. And, whether in our own selves or others, we live in a real world. Whether it's racism, sexism, or trying to do psycho-intellectual judo by leveling charges of such against others, we should expect progress without perfect, neither condemning progress because it's not perfect, nor letting foot-dragging be passed off as progress.

Besides, beyond now-owner Michael Jackson, many others in the NBA, including the players who started howling now, ignored Sterling before, like when he kicked Elgin Baylor to the curb. For some, like Mark Jackson, it's a quick change of mind.

For others, like Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, it's circle the wagons until there's too many, too strong, enemies outside:

"I like Donald," Cuban told The Mag in 2009. "He plays by his own rules." 

Well, a lot of billionaires do. That includes Mark Cuban. No telling what all he thinks is justified. Also, given that both he and Sterling are Jewish, it shows that racial or ethnic prejudice is not just limited to more narrow versions of Caucasians. (In fact, contra social justice warrior types, and per my comments a few paragraphs above, "-ism" isn't limited to any race, sex, etc.