Donald Sterling - business magnate

• published: 27 Apr 2014
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Donald Tokowitz (legally added Sterling as his last name as an adult) was born in 1933 in Chicago, Illinois, and he and his family moved to the Boyle Heights area of Los Angeles, when he was two years old. His parents, Susan and Mickey, were Jewish immigrants.[3] He attended Theodore Roosevelt High School in Los Angeles, where he was on the school's gymnastics team and served as class president; he graduated in 1952. He next attended California State University, Los Angeles (Class of 1956) and Southwestern University School of Law (Class of 1960) in Los Starting in 1961, he began to make his career as a divorce and personal injury attorney, but he made his biggest ventures in real estate, which he began when he purchased a 26-unit apartment building in Beverly Hills. Los Angeles Clippers Sterling and Los Angeles Lakers majority owner Jerry Buss were indirectly responsible for each owning their respective NBA franchises. The first instance came in 1979, in which Buss used the money he made from selling a portion of his apartment buildings to Sterling (worth $2.7 million), which covered the remaining balance in purchasing the Lakers, the Kings hockey team, and the Los Angeles Forum from Jack Kent Cooke for $67 million. Two years later, Buss suggested to Sterling that he could purchase his own NBA franchise, and Sterling bought the struggling San Diego Clippers for $12.5 million. Unlike Buss' instant success with the Lakers (including winning an NBA championship in his first season as owner, 1979--80), Sterling and his Clippers struggled through many lackluster seasons, and they did not have their first winning season until the 1991-92 season, eleven years into his ownership. Sterling has been widely criticized for his frugal operation of the Clippers, due in part to a consistent history of losing seasons. With the Clippers' move into Staples Center in the 1999-2000 NBA season, the team began to build a contender, winning 47 games in the 2005-06 season. This was a record for the most victories in a single season since the franchise moved to California. It was also only the second winning season in Sterling's tenure as owner. The overall franchise record is 56 wins, accomplished by the 2012-2013 Los Angeles Clippers. In the lockout-shortened 2011-2012 season they made the playoffs with the best winning percentage in their history (.606) and they won their first round series against the Memphis Grizzlies, 4--3, before being swept by the San Antonio Spurs, 4--0, in the conference semi-finals. Sterling rebuffed numerous offers from other cities to relocate the Clippers, and has been steadfast in his refusal to move the team out of Los Angeles, let alone sell the team. While the team played a few games in Anaheim in the Arrowhead Pond (now the Honda Center) for a few years before the Staples Center opened, he has not been willing to move the team there permanently. In recent years, he has shown an increased willingness to spend. In 2003, Sterling signed Elton Brand to a six-year, $82 million deal, the biggest contract in franchise history. He matched the contract the Utah Jazz offered restricted free agent Corey Maggette: a deal worth $45 million over six years. The Clippers have signed higher-priced veteran free agents, such as Cuttino Mobley in 2005, Tim Thomas in 2006, and Los Angeles native Baron Davis in 2008. In another first during the Sterling tenure of Clippers ownership, the team gave a four-year contract extension to head coach Mike Dunleavy, Sr., as well as a five-year extension to center Chris Kaman. Both extensions took effect starting in the 2007-08 NBA season. Under Sterling's ownership, only Dunleavy and Bill Fitch (1994--1998) have lasted four seasons or more as Clipper head coach; as of the 2009-10 NBA season, Dunleavy entered his seventh season as Clipper head coach, by far the longest tenure in franchise history, but was relieved of his coaching duties on February 4, 2010. Sterling spent $50 million to build a state-of-the-art practice facility and team headquarters in Los Angeles' Playa Vista mixed-use development neighborhood. This followed the lead of several other NBA franchises, including the Lakers, Sacramento Kings, Cleveland Cavaliers, and Detroit Pistons, in having their own facility dedicated exclusively for team use. The facility was completed and opened in September 2008, in time for the start of the team's training camp. The team previously practiced at a local health club in suburban El Segundo, and before that at Los Angeles Southwest College.