The Los Angeles Clippers owner, Donald Sterling has confirmed what many thought about him for years. He is a racist. This confirmation came after remarks he made to his girlfriend, Ms. Stiviano, the audio of which was released by TMZ on Friday. Note that he has a known girlfriend, Stiviano, even though he has a supportive wife, Rochelle, who is always by his side at games. This just adds to the track record of Sterling’s seedy character. It was no secret that Sterling was a racist, but for many years he has kept his thoughts and feeling on a low profile. The last, very public, incident of his racism was in 2009 when he had to pay $2.725 million in settlement money for discriminating against African-American and Latino families in apartment buildings that he owned around the Los Angeles area. After that case he started to keep more of a low profile about his feelings towards minorities, until the release of this ugly audiotape.

The release of the audio has had an effect on the team who have had to answer to angry fans. They are as upset as the fans are and have stressed that they don’t play for the team’s owner, but for the team. The Clippers coach, Doc Rivers is livid and said he only returned to the team because he thought the situation with Sterling had changed. He is so upset about the audio that TMZ released that Rivers is considering breaking his three-year, $21 million contract with the Clippers. First, Rivers said he needs to speak with Sterling and clear things up before making a decision, ending with “I’m just going to leave it at that.” Rivers knew that the team was and continues to be really upset and arranged a meeting with them so that they could all vent and voice concerns before they went back to the court to practice. It is unclear who will stay and who might go, but Sterling has definitely had a negative effect on the Clippers.