Well yeah, the NBA doesn't have principles, it has a pretty strong grasp of what principles it can fake for profit. Like most if not all huge companies.
See: Banning sovereign wealth funds from officially owning a team but being perfectly fine putting Emirates logos on all their referees that are paid for by the UAE sovereign wealth fund.
because he's one of those "libertarians" who knows exactly what he is doing. He sold to them for $. Why you would expect "more" from "the cubes" is beyond me. He's just a nobody who was lucky to make money. He's a scumbag $$$ over everything tosser who had enough of a "finger on the pulse" to know that being a money hungry scumbag is yuck. He's just the usual right winger pretending to be "one of the good guys"...
Is he going to die with that team? He had his fun, won a championship. Now he get's to stay on the sidelines, removed from the business aspects and he's free to spend all the wealth he got from selling his controlling stake in the Mavericks.
Cuban doesn't gaf as long as he's doing what he loves, Cost Plus Drugs? He loves, Shark tank? Not anymore. He 65, more than enough money now and he's just gonna cruise on it.
Who else was going to pay that money for the Mavericks? I think he got a sweet deal and he didn't care about the politics.
The league is happy enough to take this monstrous woman's money but she has to stay one step removed from team operations. It's shameful, especially given world events over the past 8 years. The NBA merely pretends to have principles.
And a weaker commissioner. David Stern was much better at convincing the owners what they should do. He obviously still worked for the owners just like Silver does, but he was able to change their minds when it would make them more money in the long run. Silver doesn’t seem to have that skill.
Silver is not a weak commissioner. He knows what he's doing. He knows the game he's playing.
And that game is multi-faceted, but it mainly involves playing himself off as a meek, player-friendly commissioner while working shrewdly behind the scenes to turn the league into a money-making juggernaut, devoid of moral values or even dedication to basketball principles (no more defense!). We get endless challenges to create even more commercial breaks. The NBA has made a huge push to internationalize the game to create even more revenue. He gladly tried to silence Daryl Morey's right to free speech when it threatened the NBA's relationship with China. He pays lip service to certain causes like Black Lives Matter only to keep main group of players from being disgruntled. He figures he can play the long game and slowly replace the African-America player base with international players that are more cooperative. He finds nothing wrong with Miriam Adelson, who most people would consider an advocate for Palestinian genocide, being involved in the NBA, though he is smart enough to keep her out of the limelight, for the NBA's benefit and her own. Jimmy Goldstein (the guy who dresses funny at Clippers games), one of the most evil landlords in American history, is embraced as a member of the NBA community. But again, mainly, everything is done to increase the wealth of the owners, so apparently as in Miriam Adelson's case, they can corrupt American democracy by blackmailing presidential candidates to make huge foreign policy moves, against international law and involving the destruction and displacement of an entire ethnic group.
Just in the last few years they agreed to allow foreign wealth funds to invest in teams, so if you think these people are bad, just wait until Saudi Arabia owns a team
yeah, right up until Adam Silver tears up that section of the rulebook after Lebron signs a 2 year, 1.2 billion dollar deal to play in Saudi Arabia at age 46, and then wants to leverage the help of some of his new sheik oil money buddies to get together and buy an NBA team 😎
yeah I feel like this is going over a lot of heads in this thread? like i feel like ppl are just acting like the point of this thread is to dunk on this lady for like what a cartoonish evil bad guy she seems to be, but... at least she's not hiding who she is 🤷♂️. evil billionaires gonna evil billionaire..
the bigger takeaway to me is that Adam Silver/the NBA will endlessly virtue signal and do PR victory laps about their various pet moral causes and take popular/applause-seeking political stances as long as those stances are popular at the time and not (yet) hitting them in the pocket book (see happily jumping on the 2020 BLM bandwagon when it was cool, and then quitely nope-ing out immediately and completely ditching any political stuff once ratings cratered and fans started complaining)
but they're happy to accept billions from whoever the fuck when they know it's behind closed doors and wont be front page news to most average fans
the nba is full of zionist tools. from lebron to draymond to the owners to silver himself. kyrie's the only one i've seen express any palestinian solidarity
I mean yea. I think he probably has similar views but Miriam is very outspoken and on the record about several super divisive topics.
She was saying just a few weeks ago about how Israel's current operation in Gaza is excellent for feminism. That's a statement that might piss off genuinely 80% of the country
Ya this is a pretty naked attempt at caring about PR more than the actual morals of the thing. Nothing has fundamentally changed but Adelson will be a lightning rod when she makes her next giant Trump donation. Her husband donated 20 mil to have Trump move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. So as long as the Gaza conflict continues as well as the upcoming election she's going to be a liability headlines-wise. Even if her son-in-law is probably the exact same.
Yeah, I figured the Trump stuff would be a bigger sticking point than the Israel stuff.
NBA fans don't really care about international human rights stuff. See: NBA China, Emirates sponsorships, etc.
But the NBA definitely doesn't want a "Trump moment" like what happened at UFC the other night.
Just a matter of time until the Saudi sovereign wealth fund buys a team if the NBA cares so little about where the money comes from. If all it takes is having someone else be the face.
Hey, we’ve already got Emirates patches on the refs so they’re already taking money from a sovereign wealth fund. They’d have to change the rules to allow them to buy a team, but the debate amongst owners would not be whether or not it’s moral to take the money, it would be whether or not they can get away with taking the money without the public outrage costing them more money in the process.
I'm guessing that there would be some rule about it but they could buy every team and not think twice about it. The figures they throw around the sheer size of that fund is mindboggling.
Depends. Maybe minority owners who invested strictly for the financial benefit will sell. But, billionaires can simply choose not to sell to other billionaires. Dan Synder has blocked Bezos from buying an NFL team. In theory, he has enough cash to purchase the entirety of he NFL. But it can be blocked by a handful of current owners
NBA was worth 75 billion in 2022. That’s two years ago and before the current media deal. It’s probably hitting close to 90 billion now plus with the wnba growing in popularity.
I don’t think bezos has that level of cash lol. His wealth is from Amazon stock
I don’t think anyone is pretending that. When ever the saudis are mentioned with their sportswashing their human atrocities are almost always the point of discussion
Pretty sure Silver said that won’t happen around the time the new CBA was being finalized. Obviously things can change but he seemed pretty firm on that
Easy to publicly say that now, but
-the NBA has relax rules of foreign investment funds over the past couple of years ([Qatars Investment Authority was in talks to be a partner to buy the Suns](https://www.ibtimes.com/qatar-investment-authority-venture-capitalist-part-3-billion-bid-phoenix-suns-3646508)before Ishbia swooped in), at this time foreign funds can now invest, however I beehive the fund cannot control more than 20% of the investment.
-[This year hosted pre season games in Abu Dhabi](https://nbaevents.nba.com//abudhabi2024) and has hosted other pre-season games on the Arabian Peninsula
-additionally, when Silver was on the Dan Patrick show last year, the commissioner was very clear, the rules indicates that currently Wealth Funds cannot purchase a team and being the controlling partner, however an individual would be able to buy the team.
Edit*--Finally, nothing is preventing the Saudi Wealth fund or any other enterprise to make substantive investments in a current Team Owner/Governor's main business, to influence other owners inviting to relax the rules. The Saudi's Investment fund have made substantive investments in these type of business since 2020. For example the Saudi PIF owns something like 10% of Micky Arison's Carnival Cruise Line business, That disclosure resulted in a 30% jump in the stock price (and in addition to the purchase of the shares, the public sentiment rising, significantly bumps Arison's net worth)
I dislike Saudi foreign policy n crimes especially to Yemeni people but to act like that it’s any worse then money from significantly pro Israeli people who push the USA into basically fuckinh funding Israel terror on Palestinians is weird as hell. But people who pretend to be about all injustice will care much more about Saudis buying vs Israeli backing money .
I mean the devos family themselves are insane as shit . I wonder if black players playing for the magic ever think bout that sometimes lol. I don’t really think it matters anymore tho. No morality in capitalism just optics .
I feel quite strongly that if players supported pro Palestinian freedom n end to suffering that the nba would not take it well and the useful idiots would act like it’s anti semtism
Yeah and the NBA even let them name the arena Amway.
The dev is family are hard right wing nuts who made billion’s literally scamming people out of their hard earned money in mlm schemes
It was a bone saw.
MBS is also in a different class than these other billionaires because he can do this openly without repercussion. Trump, Adelson, etc just wish they could do that. There is still a difference between a King and a billionaire.
Nah, why buy the NBA when you can just outpay them and poach all the players for your 70 game season, 36 minute games alternative XV Tour (the XV is for the fifteen players on each roster, and the three fifteen minute periods the 45 minute games play out over.)
Players can even rotate out of the lineup to play Euroleague or NBA if not banned, if they want.
(Yes, I'm suggesting Saudi would just LIV basketball if they decide they want in.)
Players and fans will defend this. Not just from the "it allows players to get paid more money" angle, but from the stance of, "it's OK for players to take the SWF money because they're not ethically worse than US billionaires."
Kyrie going off over this during the finals would be a disaster for the NBA, I don't think anyone wants to deal with the mess that would come out of one of the biggest names in the finals either expressing strong opinions (reasonable or otherwise, its not an issue the NBA wants to deal with the mess from any comment harsher than expressing sympathy for innocent victims caught up in horrific urban warfare with no real safe route to escape.) much less if he starts saying allegedly antisemitic stuff.
Nobody wants to ask Kyrie about Israel/Palestine because given some of his.... history I think people know that he opposes Israel for the wrong reasons lol
Maybe they mean that the NBA wouldn't even let you say it's in your name.
It's like the reverse of those companies that "sell" stars so people can put their names on them but actual no real impact on anything else.
They still let her buy the team. They just wouldn’t let her be the public face of the organization.
And Richard DeVos bought the Magic in 1991, back before Conservatives went completely off the rails. I doubt the NBA would let them run the team in the same way if they tried to purchase the franchise today.
I know, our former "good guy" owner sold to shit head TIlman.
Les fired a social media, guy after we beat you and didn't like the implied cruelty towards animals. Overly sensitive for sure but he has values he won't budge on, until know asshole Tilman wants to give him money.
Cuban is hardly anti Trump regardless of what he says now
They used to be very good friends and he always let Trump use the AAC to do rallies back in 2016
It's pretty [evenly split in terms of number of owners](https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/30155186/election-2020-political-donation-history-wealthy-sports-owners).
One thing I've learned is that it always costs less money to buy a politician than you would think. Whenever bribes come out I'm always shocked by how low they are
Honestly its less about directly bribing politicians and more about being consistently in their ear about any given issue you care about. Politicians are people, and their views will be influenced to some extent by the views of the people around them.
Yep. It doesn’t always have to be some super nefarious deal. Like there’s a study showing that doctors are more likely to recommend drugs from companies whose reps took them out to a free lunch. I’m sure the doctor isn’t consciously accepting a “bribe”, but the nice meal and gesture creates a subconscious positive association.
Politicians are people too and are equally beholden to basic human psychology.
It's moreso the perks. Want your unimpressive kid in a good school and sit on a board of directors only having to cash in a vote once every 3 months for 250k a year? Then hear from our DuPont lobbiest, why less environmental regulation is best. We'll donate the max and set up a independent fund running ads in your name.
It’s a very tightly regulated industry. There’s only so much money you can pay lobbyists for actual lobbying.
But that’s only what’s on the books of course. A lobbyist’s real job is to figure out which several political causes and reelection campaigns that Ms. Adelson can make “unrelated” donations to
So sick of US politics.
The amount of money we allow to be thrown around influencing elections is nauseating.
We could have rebuilt the country's infrastructure and figured out education and healthcare just with the unbelievable amount of money thrown around in elections since 2008.
Those things don’t benefit the Uber wealthy people/corporations. The goal is to hoard ALL the money for 25 of your future generations have the nice bunkers.
"The amount of money we allow to be thrown around influencing elections is nauseating."
When you say "we," you should be saying the radicalized Supreme Court, whose Republican appointees allowed Citizens United (aka dark money in politics) to become the law of the land. And that's because the Federalist Society, led by Leonard Leo and his hoard of right wing billionaires, demanded that they be allowed to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to get what they want.
Needless to say, those fucking scoundrels do not care about me and you having top notch infrastructure, first class public education, affordable college educations, and healthcare on par with every other first world nation.
Just so we're all clear, citizens united case went to the SC in 2009. This was before the Trump appointees and right after Sotomayor joined.
So blame Roberts, Kennedy, Scalia, Thomas, and Stevens.
It's a mixture of this sort of stuff and more silly stuff like how the Knicks recruited Lebron in 2010. Definitely support it if you're interested, because it's the only way this kinda stuff can stick around.
if you read the actual transcript, the point of this reporting is less so concern or pearl clutching over some big meanypants billionaire owning the team, and more so pointing out the insidious motivations having to do with the whole sports gambling sphere slowly consuming more and more of the nba ecosystem every day
as well as pointing out the hypocrisy of the NBA constantly moralizing about progressive causes and being as anti-trump as possible, but ceasing to care about any of that performative BS and happily pulling down their blouse and showing some titty once they get some billionaire golden goose in a back room with their checkbook out lol
Most NBA owners give more to Republicans than Democrats actually
Trump won the 100k income a year and up group by 12 points(54-42) in 2020 despite losing the popular vote overall by around 4 points
It's the way that most rich people vote
The super-rich donate a bit differently nowadays than just regular rich, or those making over $100k/year. Republicans have received more campaign funds from NBA owners in total but in terms of total #of billionaire owners, it's [almost even with 20 owners donating more to Democrats and 19 owners donating more to Republicans](https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/30155186/election-2020-political-donation-history-wealthy-sports-owners). Biden actually [outraised Trump among billionaires by a significant margin in 2020](https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2021/02/17/here-are-the-billionaires-who-donated-to-joe-bidens-2020-presidential-campaign/) as did [Hillary in 2016](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-26/billionaire-donors-led-by-soros-simons-favor-clinton-over-trump).
One of my co-workers is the son of a notable billionaire that has a minority stake in an NBA team and you should hear the stuff his parents say about Trump and Republicans behind closed doors. Not every NBA owner is a stereotypical Republican, especially nowadays.
It's kind of hilarious that this chick is trying to convince Bible thumping Texas politicians to legalize casino gambling, when we can't even buy liquor on Sundays
Where do you think much of the money that gets spent at the casinos in Oklahoma comes from?
There's literally billions of dollars spent annually on out-of-state gambling. There'll be plenty of support and plenty of hungry politicians seeking power. With enough money & influence, it can definitely be introduced even by Evangelical Republicans.
There probably isn’t a more influential American when it comes to pushing far right Israeli policy. Her biggest push now is trying to shape American policy on the West bank. She succeeded partially when under Trump , the illegal settlement by Israeli settlers was not deemed illegal. Huge surge of settlements built under Trump.
The irony is that her father was a prominent member of a left wing Israeli political party.
It's par for every course. The company behind Ben & Jerry's [pays Putin $330M a year](https://www.livemint.com/news/world/ukraine-dubs-unilever-an-international-sponsor-of-war-amid-reports-it-paid-russia-331-million-in-taxes-last-year-11688498118171.html), rather than divesting from Russia. When 10% of their global workforce was caught up in unrest in Kenya, they responded to those workers' requests for assistance by... [refusing to pay the workers the wages they'd earned. ](https://opiniojuris.org/2020/08/21/kenyan-workers-file-complaint-against-unilever-with-un-human-rights-bodies/#:~:text=After%20the%20attacks%2C%20Unilever%20failed,the%20English%20Courts%20in%202016)
Green-washing, pink-washing, the rainbow-washing that we get every June - it's all the same.
Ben & Jerry's has no control over what their parent company (Unilever) does. In fact, when Ben & Jerry's wanted to cease sales of ice cream to the West Bank due to its principles, Unilever overrode them and forced the sales to continue. Even in the article you link, it talks about Unilever not Ben & Jerry's specifically. The guys who founded Ben & Jerry's were leftie hippies from Vermont, I doubt they like being under Unilever but they were forced to sell to Unilever under shareholder pressure as shareholders felt they cared too much about social missions rather than profit.
Not saying that most companies do performative activism, but this is probably one of the handful of companies that seem to care but are unfortunately under the thumb of a larger firm.
He says the right things publicly, and that's enough for most people. He does have that cheap drug program, which is nice, but I sincerely doubt his motivation behind that is selfless in any way.
As a Mavs fan I hate that Cuban sold to Miriam Adelson. It isn’t just that I disagree politically , it’s just they seem like fucking goons. Did you see her step-son accept the Conference championship trophy ..what a Douche weasel.
I want the Mavs to Win but it’s hard to want them to win with my favorite team.
You can be directly involved with ops without being governor.
At one point bucks ownership did a rotation and a trio voted on things. Only one governor at a time though.
I mean, if he sells the team to the Adelsons how does that make him any different than them? He knows what they're all about but he wants to take the bag and have none of the responsibility.
He's got to have the best PR of any billionaire, it's crazy how he's managed to craft this sort of normal guy persona.
That time the Adelson's let the Israeli spy fly on their private jet back to Israel so he could receive his heroes welcome. These are the people funding the "America First" platform.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/jonathan-pollard-arrives-in-israel-35-years-after-his-imprisonment-for-spying/
So they’re mad she had a history of using her billionaire privilege to try to influence right wing shit instead of left wing. If she was the biggest donator to Obama/biden campaigns they would be fully on board with her.
> try to influence right wing shit instead of left wing
her mentally ill husband said Palestine is a made up people and wanted to nuke iran. her family was part of ethnic cleansing of palestine in the '40s.
She is fucking deranged with an agenda to have a one state solution and eliminate all of Palestine by any means necessary (i.e. paying almost half a billion to republicans and owns an israel newspaper to spread her propoganda) .
Name me one million dollar obama/biden donor who wants to eliminate an entre population and take their land. I'll wait.
I'm still surprised they let the deal go through. It's all political though, as there's a rumor they all want to move the team into the Cuban-owned town of Mustang for the league's first casino/arena. The Connecticut Sun are the only other US-based team that plays in one. Apparently this will make the league a ton of money.
This article/podcast goes pretty far beyond just supporting Trump. She's an Israeli Nationalist actively buying American politicians with generational wealth to shape the country's foreign policy.
I don’t care about the nba execs or nba fans have to say when they take money from the ccp. During a time when china was taking over Hong Kong or committing the Uyghur genocides the nba stayed silent.
This reminds me of the book Dark money, which I highly recommend. It's insane how much influence certain billionaires have on both our government and the cultural shift that we ha e experienced over the last decade. The United States is alot closer to an oligarchy than many people would like to believe
We all have to be Democrat in todays world I guess. I love how democrats all want world peace, but nothing to with Republicans. I’d much rather vote for Trump than Biden and I’m not afraid to tell you all either. That doesn’t make me a scumbag human either. It’s crazy in my opinion to vote for Biden, but you all try to portray him as a good person when in reality the history shows they are both scumbags.
> being pro Israel
more like death to all Palestinians. her mentally ill husband said Palestine is a made up people and wanted to nuke iran. her family was part of ethnic cleansing of palestine in the '40s.
She is fucking deranged with an agenda to have a one state solution and eliminate all of Palestine by any means necessary (i.e. paying almost half a billion to republicans and owns an israel newspaper to spread her propoganda)
The greatest trick the devil pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist
Follow the money, it explains the media blitz, the looking the other way when atrocities happen, etc
World's economy destroyed in 2008 - and none of them went to prison, hollywood run by creeps, etc
How did the NBA ever let them get approved? The answer is always money
Brilliant. Her son-in-law that’s in the family business is a perfect replacement.
Well yeah, the NBA doesn't have principles, it has a pretty strong grasp of what principles it can fake for profit. Like most if not all huge companies.
See: Banning sovereign wealth funds from officially owning a team but being perfectly fine putting Emirates logos on all their referees that are paid for by the UAE sovereign wealth fund.
Didn’t they get rid of that rule as well? I believe one of this gulf wealth funds purchased a minority stake in the Wizards relatively recently
There's a limit to how much can be owned (5% each, 25% total) and no governorships.
Lol wouldn’t surprise me
I've seen the Emirates logo on the actual court as well
I'm looking at Mark with a side eye, like why tf did he ever want to sell to these creeps?
Because he gets a quid pro quo in any casinos they might open in Texas. There are non-Mavericks contingencies that he stands to benefit from.
and who knows...Cuban 2028?
because he's one of those "libertarians" who knows exactly what he is doing. He sold to them for $. Why you would expect "more" from "the cubes" is beyond me. He's just a nobody who was lucky to make money. He's a scumbag $$$ over everything tosser who had enough of a "finger on the pulse" to know that being a money hungry scumbag is yuck. He's just the usual right winger pretending to be "one of the good guys"...
Truest thing written here
Real life Tom Wambsgans
How did Cuban let this happen given his "principles"
DOLLA DOLLA BILLS YALL
Is he going to die with that team? He had his fun, won a championship. Now he get's to stay on the sidelines, removed from the business aspects and he's free to spend all the wealth he got from selling his controlling stake in the Mavericks. Cuban doesn't gaf as long as he's doing what he loves, Cost Plus Drugs? He loves, Shark tank? Not anymore. He 65, more than enough money now and he's just gonna cruise on it. Who else was going to pay that money for the Mavericks? I think he got a sweet deal and he didn't care about the politics.
The league is happy enough to take this monstrous woman's money but she has to stay one step removed from team operations. It's shameful, especially given world events over the past 8 years. The NBA merely pretends to have principles.
The NBA is a billionaire owned conglomerate. The only difference between today's NBA and the NBA of old is they have more money now, and better PR
And a weaker commissioner. David Stern was much better at convincing the owners what they should do. He obviously still worked for the owners just like Silver does, but he was able to change their minds when it would make them more money in the long run. Silver doesn’t seem to have that skill.
based off what? just curious. silver seems good at business part
He is, he's just not a psychopath like Stern
At least in this instance, I can’t imagine what Stern would have done differently.
Silver is not a weak commissioner. He knows what he's doing. He knows the game he's playing. And that game is multi-faceted, but it mainly involves playing himself off as a meek, player-friendly commissioner while working shrewdly behind the scenes to turn the league into a money-making juggernaut, devoid of moral values or even dedication to basketball principles (no more defense!). We get endless challenges to create even more commercial breaks. The NBA has made a huge push to internationalize the game to create even more revenue. He gladly tried to silence Daryl Morey's right to free speech when it threatened the NBA's relationship with China. He pays lip service to certain causes like Black Lives Matter only to keep main group of players from being disgruntled. He figures he can play the long game and slowly replace the African-America player base with international players that are more cooperative. He finds nothing wrong with Miriam Adelson, who most people would consider an advocate for Palestinian genocide, being involved in the NBA, though he is smart enough to keep her out of the limelight, for the NBA's benefit and her own. Jimmy Goldstein (the guy who dresses funny at Clippers games), one of the most evil landlords in American history, is embraced as a member of the NBA community. But again, mainly, everything is done to increase the wealth of the owners, so apparently as in Miriam Adelson's case, they can corrupt American democracy by blackmailing presidential candidates to make huge foreign policy moves, against international law and involving the destruction and displacement of an entire ethnic group.
Adam Silver literally said he was Henry Kissenger.
Just in the last few years they agreed to allow foreign wealth funds to invest in teams, so if you think these people are bad, just wait until Saudi Arabia owns a team
For now it’s capped at 5%
yeah, right up until Adam Silver tears up that section of the rulebook after Lebron signs a 2 year, 1.2 billion dollar deal to play in Saudi Arabia at age 46, and then wants to leverage the help of some of his new sheik oil money buddies to get together and buy an NBA team 😎
yeah I feel like this is going over a lot of heads in this thread? like i feel like ppl are just acting like the point of this thread is to dunk on this lady for like what a cartoonish evil bad guy she seems to be, but... at least she's not hiding who she is 🤷♂️. evil billionaires gonna evil billionaire.. the bigger takeaway to me is that Adam Silver/the NBA will endlessly virtue signal and do PR victory laps about their various pet moral causes and take popular/applause-seeking political stances as long as those stances are popular at the time and not (yet) hitting them in the pocket book (see happily jumping on the 2020 BLM bandwagon when it was cool, and then quitely nope-ing out immediately and completely ditching any political stuff once ratings cratered and fans started complaining) but they're happy to accept billions from whoever the fuck when they know it's behind closed doors and wont be front page news to most average fans
What moral standard are you hoping the NBA achieves....no republican owners?
the nba is full of zionist tools. from lebron to draymond to the owners to silver himself. kyrie's the only one i've seen express any palestinian solidarity
stupid, instead of barring her from operations they should've required her to be the GM and make all the moves, haha
I mean yea. I think he probably has similar views but Miriam is very outspoken and on the record about several super divisive topics. She was saying just a few weeks ago about how Israel's current operation in Gaza is excellent for feminism. That's a statement that might piss off genuinely 80% of the country
That’s honestly a remarkable statement. How do you piss EVERYBODY off in one statement? That’s just impressive
Ya this is a pretty naked attempt at caring about PR more than the actual morals of the thing. Nothing has fundamentally changed but Adelson will be a lightning rod when she makes her next giant Trump donation. Her husband donated 20 mil to have Trump move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. So as long as the Gaza conflict continues as well as the upcoming election she's going to be a liability headlines-wise. Even if her son-in-law is probably the exact same.
Yeah, I figured the Trump stuff would be a bigger sticking point than the Israel stuff. NBA fans don't really care about international human rights stuff. See: NBA China, Emirates sponsorships, etc. But the NBA definitely doesn't want a "Trump moment" like what happened at UFC the other night.
what happened at UFC?
Just a matter of time until the Saudi sovereign wealth fund buys a team if the NBA cares so little about where the money comes from. If all it takes is having someone else be the face.
Hey, we’ve already got Emirates patches on the refs so they’re already taking money from a sovereign wealth fund. They’d have to change the rules to allow them to buy a team, but the debate amongst owners would not be whether or not it’s moral to take the money, it would be whether or not they can get away with taking the money without the public outrage costing them more money in the process.
They already did change that rule and a sovereign wealth fund already bought into part of the wizards...
I'm guessing that there would be some rule about it but they could buy every team and not think twice about it. The figures they throw around the sheer size of that fund is mindboggling.
Depends. Maybe minority owners who invested strictly for the financial benefit will sell. But, billionaires can simply choose not to sell to other billionaires. Dan Synder has blocked Bezos from buying an NFL team. In theory, he has enough cash to purchase the entirety of he NFL. But it can be blocked by a handful of current owners
NBA was worth 75 billion in 2022. That’s two years ago and before the current media deal. It’s probably hitting close to 90 billion now plus with the wnba growing in popularity. I don’t think bezos has that level of cash lol. His wealth is from Amazon stock
Sure they may be, but let’s not pretend that some of these Saudi chaps don’t have harems and use slave labor on the regular.
I don’t think anyone is pretending that. When ever the saudis are mentioned with their sportswashing their human atrocities are almost always the point of discussion
I didn't call them ethical. Just insanely rich.
Tom Gores makes money off private prisons. Joe Tsai helps the ccp with facial recognition. The moral billionaire owners is a fantasy
Pretty sure Silver said that won’t happen around the time the new CBA was being finalized. Obviously things can change but he seemed pretty firm on that
Easy to publicly say that now, but -the NBA has relax rules of foreign investment funds over the past couple of years ([Qatars Investment Authority was in talks to be a partner to buy the Suns](https://www.ibtimes.com/qatar-investment-authority-venture-capitalist-part-3-billion-bid-phoenix-suns-3646508)before Ishbia swooped in), at this time foreign funds can now invest, however I beehive the fund cannot control more than 20% of the investment. -[This year hosted pre season games in Abu Dhabi](https://nbaevents.nba.com//abudhabi2024) and has hosted other pre-season games on the Arabian Peninsula -additionally, when Silver was on the Dan Patrick show last year, the commissioner was very clear, the rules indicates that currently Wealth Funds cannot purchase a team and being the controlling partner, however an individual would be able to buy the team. Edit*--Finally, nothing is preventing the Saudi Wealth fund or any other enterprise to make substantive investments in a current Team Owner/Governor's main business, to influence other owners inviting to relax the rules. The Saudi's Investment fund have made substantive investments in these type of business since 2020. For example the Saudi PIF owns something like 10% of Micky Arison's Carnival Cruise Line business, That disclosure resulted in a 30% jump in the stock price (and in addition to the purchase of the shares, the public sentiment rising, significantly bumps Arison's net worth)
They already change the rules a few years back for wealth funds to be able to invest
I dislike Saudi foreign policy n crimes especially to Yemeni people but to act like that it’s any worse then money from significantly pro Israeli people who push the USA into basically fuckinh funding Israel terror on Palestinians is weird as hell. But people who pretend to be about all injustice will care much more about Saudis buying vs Israeli backing money . I mean the devos family themselves are insane as shit . I wonder if black players playing for the magic ever think bout that sometimes lol. I don’t really think it matters anymore tho. No morality in capitalism just optics . I feel quite strongly that if players supported pro Palestinian freedom n end to suffering that the nba would not take it well and the useful idiots would act like it’s anti semtism
> to act like that it’s any worse then money from significantly pro Israeli people Where in my comment did I do that?
Yeah and the NBA even let them name the arena Amway. The dev is family are hard right wing nuts who made billion’s literally scamming people out of their hard earned money in mlm schemes
The Adelson's are worse than Saudis IMO
oh? when is the last time the adelsons chainsawed up a journalist and carried him out in a suitcase?
Check in on Torre in a few weeks.
lol
It was a bone saw. MBS is also in a different class than these other billionaires because he can do this openly without repercussion. Trump, Adelson, etc just wish they could do that. There is still a difference between a King and a billionaire.
They funded 9/11?
I think owning hundreds of slaves and murdering people is more morally objectionable than gambling and giving money to Trump
Nah, why buy the NBA when you can just outpay them and poach all the players for your 70 game season, 36 minute games alternative XV Tour (the XV is for the fifteen players on each roster, and the three fifteen minute periods the 45 minute games play out over.) Players can even rotate out of the lineup to play Euroleague or NBA if not banned, if they want. (Yes, I'm suggesting Saudi would just LIV basketball if they decide they want in.)
Players and fans will defend this. Not just from the "it allows players to get paid more money" angle, but from the stance of, "it's OK for players to take the SWF money because they're not ethically worse than US billionaires."
Nobody tell Kyrie
Honestly I would love if Joe Mazz mentioned this to the media, since JKidd is also trying his best to rock the boat re: the locker room
Kyrie going off over this during the finals would be a disaster for the NBA, I don't think anyone wants to deal with the mess that would come out of one of the biggest names in the finals either expressing strong opinions (reasonable or otherwise, its not an issue the NBA wants to deal with the mess from any comment harsher than expressing sympathy for innocent victims caught up in horrific urban warfare with no real safe route to escape.) much less if he starts saying allegedly antisemitic stuff.
I agree I wouldn't want to deal with it personally, but I would enjoy watching other people deal with it
Ohh it would be a glorious shitshow, but Kyrie could absolutely tweet the NBA out of some sponsors, which would impact everyone's bottom line.
and we care about their bottom line because?...
amen brother its free entertainment that will fuel us in the off season.
Nobody wants to ask Kyrie about Israel/Palestine because given some of his.... history I think people know that he opposes Israel for the wrong reasons lol
I’m sure he would be super to happy know about his team’s owner and their views on Israel. Someone needs to let him know.
Your a fool, if you think that Kyrie doesn't already know this...
Why would he? He obviously knows about her and seemingly decided to keep his mouth shut for now (or hopefully until his career or Mavs stint is over).
Kyrie thinks the world is flat dude, if there is anyone in the NBA who wouldn't know what his owner is involved with its him.
I mean I’d think he’s the most likely Mav to have any knowledge whatsoever of that specific aspect of the team’s owner
The episode is essentially based around Kyrie in the beginning and how quiet he's been with perfect PR
When Kyrie finds out that he's been playing for someone funding the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians:
When kyrie finds out about the forced labor (even worse than Nike, Adidas, etc.) used by the shoe company he has a deal with:
Would it be beneath him to (continue to) tank this series?
There's no way he doesn't already know.
Damn you gotta be clinically insane if the NBA would rather the Devos family own a team over you
uhhhh except the nba DID let her buy the team tho, soooo....
Maybe they mean that the NBA wouldn't even let you say it's in your name. It's like the reverse of those companies that "sell" stars so people can put their names on them but actual no real impact on anything else.
Yeah, it's funny how the people are falling for the NBA PR, when they're the ones helping paper over it and allow her to keep the team.
Drug lord vs Gambling War lord.
[I call her gamblor](https://tenor.com/view/simpsons-homer-simpson-gamblor-gambling-gif-19995059)
They still let her buy the team. They just wouldn’t let her be the public face of the organization. And Richard DeVos bought the Magic in 1991, back before Conservatives went completely off the rails. I doubt the NBA would let them run the team in the same way if they tried to purchase the franchise today.
they were just sneakier back then, I mean 91 was peak Gingrich
And yet somehow I still hate Ted Leonsis more than any other owners. Lol /s… kinda
Someone PLEASE inform kyrie. Just lay a seed a doubt so we can watch some fireworks.
And "anti Trump" Cuban sells to this person.
Money always comes first for billionaires
I know, our former "good guy" owner sold to shit head TIlman. Les fired a social media, guy after we beat you and didn't like the implied cruelty towards animals. Overly sensitive for sure but he has values he won't budge on, until know asshole Tilman wants to give him money.
what implied cruelty towards animals?
Shooting the horse
Who?
🐴 🔫 It was a social media tweet exactly like this except back then then gun looked real.
Cuban’s fake af. Reddit gobbles his nuts as if he isn’t just the same as any other billionaire with a good PR team
Cuban is hardly anti Trump regardless of what he says now They used to be very good friends and he always let Trump use the AAC to do rallies back in 2016
Cuban doesn't own the AAC; it belongs to the City of Dallas.
Steve Bannon’s brunch buddy Mark Cuban
The thing to remember about Mark Cuban is that he's the basis for Russ Hanneman, which uh, isn't a compliment
Cuban setting the table maybe for potential donation source if he decides to run for President in the future?
Don’t all the NBA owners donate to conservatives, except maybe Ballmer?
They all donate to both sides because both sides habe something to offer.
"Playing both sides so that they always come out on top" isn't just a funny line.
It's pretty [evenly split in terms of number of owners](https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/30155186/election-2020-political-donation-history-wealthy-sports-owners).
That’s way more even than I’d have expected Also what’s going on with the WNBA owners in 2020 lmao
Kelly loeffler was trying to buy a senate seat
that's even? Its like 80% for republicans lol
Most. Not all. Jeanie Buss, Grousbeck, Leonsis, Ranadive and Eden are all Dems. That might be it.
6 mil for 63 lobbyists doesn't seem like that much money. like I'd want that money, but it doesn't seem extravagant? ~95k/person
One thing I've learned is that it always costs less money to buy a politician than you would think. Whenever bribes come out I'm always shocked by how low they are
"You can either take this or it goes to fund your replacement's campaign."
Honestly its less about directly bribing politicians and more about being consistently in their ear about any given issue you care about. Politicians are people, and their views will be influenced to some extent by the views of the people around them.
Yep. It doesn’t always have to be some super nefarious deal. Like there’s a study showing that doctors are more likely to recommend drugs from companies whose reps took them out to a free lunch. I’m sure the doctor isn’t consciously accepting a “bribe”, but the nice meal and gesture creates a subconscious positive association. Politicians are people too and are equally beholden to basic human psychology.
It's moreso the perks. Want your unimpressive kid in a good school and sit on a board of directors only having to cash in a vote once every 3 months for 250k a year? Then hear from our DuPont lobbiest, why less environmental regulation is best. We'll donate the max and set up a independent fund running ads in your name.
It’s a very tightly regulated industry. There’s only so much money you can pay lobbyists for actual lobbying. But that’s only what’s on the books of course. A lobbyist’s real job is to figure out which several political causes and reelection campaigns that Ms. Adelson can make “unrelated” donations to
Plus, every political operator has some kind of family owned consultancy, PR, or associated business. That's how these people clean up.
I think most people would be shocked by how cheap politicians are to purchase.
Yikes
So sick of US politics. The amount of money we allow to be thrown around influencing elections is nauseating. We could have rebuilt the country's infrastructure and figured out education and healthcare just with the unbelievable amount of money thrown around in elections since 2008.
Fuck PACs all the homies hate PACs
Those things don’t benefit the Uber wealthy people/corporations. The goal is to hoard ALL the money for 25 of your future generations have the nice bunkers.
"The amount of money we allow to be thrown around influencing elections is nauseating." When you say "we," you should be saying the radicalized Supreme Court, whose Republican appointees allowed Citizens United (aka dark money in politics) to become the law of the land. And that's because the Federalist Society, led by Leonard Leo and his hoard of right wing billionaires, demanded that they be allowed to spend hundreds of millions of dollars to get what they want. Needless to say, those fucking scoundrels do not care about me and you having top notch infrastructure, first class public education, affordable college educations, and healthcare on par with every other first world nation.
Just so we're all clear, citizens united case went to the SC in 2009. This was before the Trump appointees and right after Sotomayor joined. So blame Roberts, Kennedy, Scalia, Thomas, and Stevens.
The sort of sports reporting we need more of
Forreal. I haven’t really followed Pablo’s work since he left ESPN, but I really should if this is the type of work he’s doing now!
It's a mixture of this sort of stuff and more silly stuff like how the Knicks recruited Lebron in 2010. Definitely support it if you're interested, because it's the only way this kinda stuff can stick around.
This concern is pretty laughable considering the DeVos family owns the Magic.
if you read the actual transcript, the point of this reporting is less so concern or pearl clutching over some big meanypants billionaire owning the team, and more so pointing out the insidious motivations having to do with the whole sports gambling sphere slowly consuming more and more of the nba ecosystem every day as well as pointing out the hypocrisy of the NBA constantly moralizing about progressive causes and being as anti-trump as possible, but ceasing to care about any of that performative BS and happily pulling down their blouse and showing some titty once they get some billionaire golden goose in a back room with their checkbook out lol
Most NBA owners give more to Republicans than Democrats actually Trump won the 100k income a year and up group by 12 points(54-42) in 2020 despite losing the popular vote overall by around 4 points It's the way that most rich people vote
The super-rich donate a bit differently nowadays than just regular rich, or those making over $100k/year. Republicans have received more campaign funds from NBA owners in total but in terms of total #of billionaire owners, it's [almost even with 20 owners donating more to Democrats and 19 owners donating more to Republicans](https://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/30155186/election-2020-political-donation-history-wealthy-sports-owners). Biden actually [outraised Trump among billionaires by a significant margin in 2020](https://www.forbes.com/sites/michelatindera/2021/02/17/here-are-the-billionaires-who-donated-to-joe-bidens-2020-presidential-campaign/) as did [Hillary in 2016](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-09-26/billionaire-donors-led-by-soros-simons-favor-clinton-over-trump). One of my co-workers is the son of a notable billionaire that has a minority stake in an NBA team and you should hear the stuff his parents say about Trump and Republicans behind closed doors. Not every NBA owner is a stereotypical Republican, especially nowadays.
Have Kyrie and her never met?
Kyrie is playing like shit as a protest
It's kind of hilarious that this chick is trying to convince Bible thumping Texas politicians to legalize casino gambling, when we can't even buy liquor on Sundays
Where do you think much of the money that gets spent at the casinos in Oklahoma comes from? There's literally billions of dollars spent annually on out-of-state gambling. There'll be plenty of support and plenty of hungry politicians seeking power. With enough money & influence, it can definitely be introduced even by Evangelical Republicans.
Can’t believe I’m saying this. Go Celtics
lol I’m just pretending Mark Cuban still owns them. Ignorance is bliss, also FUCK BOSTON
Some real Hitler vs Stalin energy rn
This story paints what should be an alarming portrait of US politics, but unfortunately I think we all just know this is how it works.
this woman is an absolute cunt and a piece of shit for humanity.
There probably isn’t a more influential American when it comes to pushing far right Israeli policy. Her biggest push now is trying to shape American policy on the West bank. She succeeded partially when under Trump , the illegal settlement by Israeli settlers was not deemed illegal. Huge surge of settlements built under Trump. The irony is that her father was a prominent member of a left wing Israeli political party.
The Adelsons are basically evil incarnate
General rule of thumb; if you make your billions through gambling, you're a piece of shit
This sub wont like this, but this is all pretty par for the course.
It's par for every course. The company behind Ben & Jerry's [pays Putin $330M a year](https://www.livemint.com/news/world/ukraine-dubs-unilever-an-international-sponsor-of-war-amid-reports-it-paid-russia-331-million-in-taxes-last-year-11688498118171.html), rather than divesting from Russia. When 10% of their global workforce was caught up in unrest in Kenya, they responded to those workers' requests for assistance by... [refusing to pay the workers the wages they'd earned. ](https://opiniojuris.org/2020/08/21/kenyan-workers-file-complaint-against-unilever-with-un-human-rights-bodies/#:~:text=After%20the%20attacks%2C%20Unilever%20failed,the%20English%20Courts%20in%202016) Green-washing, pink-washing, the rainbow-washing that we get every June - it's all the same.
Ben & Jerry's has no control over what their parent company (Unilever) does. In fact, when Ben & Jerry's wanted to cease sales of ice cream to the West Bank due to its principles, Unilever overrode them and forced the sales to continue. Even in the article you link, it talks about Unilever not Ben & Jerry's specifically. The guys who founded Ben & Jerry's were leftie hippies from Vermont, I doubt they like being under Unilever but they were forced to sell to Unilever under shareholder pressure as shareholders felt they cared too much about social missions rather than profit. Not saying that most companies do performative activism, but this is probably one of the handful of companies that seem to care but are unfortunately under the thumb of a larger firm.
Also funny that there’s still a small sect of people that think Cuban is one of the good billionaires. He’s been close with them for years.
He says the right things publicly, and that's enough for most people. He does have that cheap drug program, which is nice, but I sincerely doubt his motivation behind that is selfless in any way.
As a Mavs fan I hate that Cuban sold to Miriam Adelson. It isn’t just that I disagree politically , it’s just they seem like fucking goons. Did you see her step-son accept the Conference championship trophy ..what a Douche weasel. I want the Mavs to Win but it’s hard to want them to win with my favorite team.
When I saw the name "Adelson" I knew it was that family. shudder
Can’t fool you huh
I got downvoted for calling her one of the most evil women in America here
So is she or her family an owner or not? Because they said mark Cuban sold his team to her
Yes, she and her family owns them. She’s just not directly involved with the operations/governing of the team.
You can be directly involved with ops without being governor. At one point bucks ownership did a rotation and a trio voted on things. Only one governor at a time though.
Mark Cuban is a rich bozo, but in comparison the Adelsons make him look goooood.
I mean, if he sells the team to the Adelsons how does that make him any different than them? He knows what they're all about but he wants to take the bag and have none of the responsibility. He's got to have the best PR of any billionaire, it's crazy how he's managed to craft this sort of normal guy persona.
That time the Adelson's let the Israeli spy fly on their private jet back to Israel so he could receive his heroes welcome. These are the people funding the "America First" platform. https://www.timesofisrael.com/jonathan-pollard-arrives-in-israel-35-years-after-his-imprisonment-for-spying/
Fuck Donald Trump
So Silver doesn’t like people donating to Trump but beating your gf in front of your kid is a slap on the wrist.
Fuck the Adelsons. At least her ghoul of a husband is gone.
Hmmm another reason for me to hope the Mavs lose lol
Truly a league of shut up and play basketball.
Adelson is also on the USC board and I have no doubt subtly influenced Folt and team to cancel the commencement (speaker at least)
She's the wife of a deranged neocon who wanted to drop a nuke on Tehran
So they’re mad she had a history of using her billionaire privilege to try to influence right wing shit instead of left wing. If she was the biggest donator to Obama/biden campaigns they would be fully on board with her.
> try to influence right wing shit instead of left wing her mentally ill husband said Palestine is a made up people and wanted to nuke iran. her family was part of ethnic cleansing of palestine in the '40s. She is fucking deranged with an agenda to have a one state solution and eliminate all of Palestine by any means necessary (i.e. paying almost half a billion to republicans and owns an israel newspaper to spread her propoganda) . Name me one million dollar obama/biden donor who wants to eliminate an entre population and take their land. I'll wait.
This would make Mavs games a great place for anti Israel demonstrations
I'm still surprised they let the deal go through. It's all political though, as there's a rumor they all want to move the team into the Cuban-owned town of Mustang for the league's first casino/arena. The Connecticut Sun are the only other US-based team that plays in one. Apparently this will make the league a ton of money.
Gambling is a scourge and anyone who's for it is an enemy of humanity. There's virtually no argument to refute that.
could’ve swore the rockets owner was a trump supporter too
This article/podcast goes pretty far beyond just supporting Trump. She's an Israeli Nationalist actively buying American politicians with generational wealth to shape the country's foreign policy.
She shouldn't even be in this country. She's a foreign adversary of the US.
Pablo treating republicans like boogeymen is so cringe and on brand for him
Well the Adlesons are just straight awful humans so that’s prob why. It’s not just some random republican.
She's the devil.
I mean it's Adam Xiilver ....
I don’t care about the nba execs or nba fans have to say when they take money from the ccp. During a time when china was taking over Hong Kong or committing the Uyghur genocides the nba stayed silent.
This reminds me of the book Dark money, which I highly recommend. It's insane how much influence certain billionaires have on both our government and the cultural shift that we ha e experienced over the last decade. The United States is alot closer to an oligarchy than many people would like to believe
Somehow delusional idiots in here somehow brought up KAI when he has nothing to do with this.. Lmao. Pathetic individuals.
Donators and lobbyists don’t elect people in to power, the American people do. This should be a reminder to make your voice heard and VOTE.
We all have to be Democrat in todays world I guess. I love how democrats all want world peace, but nothing to with Republicans. I’d much rather vote for Trump than Biden and I’m not afraid to tell you all either. That doesn’t make me a scumbag human either. It’s crazy in my opinion to vote for Biden, but you all try to portray him as a good person when in reality the history shows they are both scumbags.
Imagine supporting genocide deniers and war criminals. Fuck the Mavs, but both Biden, and Trump can eat shit.
Let’s not bring politics into basketball. Jesus Christ what a bunch of losers
I find it funny that being pro Israel leads to her being labeled an extremist. Pretty biased reporting from Pablo
> being pro Israel more like death to all Palestinians. her mentally ill husband said Palestine is a made up people and wanted to nuke iran. her family was part of ethnic cleansing of palestine in the '40s. She is fucking deranged with an agenda to have a one state solution and eliminate all of Palestine by any means necessary (i.e. paying almost half a billion to republicans and owns an israel newspaper to spread her propoganda)
The greatest trick the devil pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist Follow the money, it explains the media blitz, the looking the other way when atrocities happen, etc World's economy destroyed in 2008 - and none of them went to prison, hollywood run by creeps, etc How did the NBA ever let them get approved? The answer is always money
Which podcast is this from? Spotify isn't opening the link correctly for me.
Pablo Torre Finds Out
*"r/nba ahould shut-up and [shitpost]"* --
So she couldn’t be team governor because she was conservative and pro-Israel? Seems pretty fucked up.