Letters to Sports: Clippers and Kawhi Leonard get off easy; fans are big losers

Punish the offenders, not the fans. Kawhi Leonard’s uncle tried this with the Lakers and failed, but apparently succeeded with the Clippers. He has been banished for five years, but it should’ve been lifetime. The team is fined $30 million, a drop in the bucket to the owner who, with other executives, got suspended for up to a year. Leonard gets fined $700,000, also a drop in the bucket for someone who should also have been suspended. But five first-round draft choices eliminated for the Clippers, a team that was already acquiring draft picks in an obvious rebuild! That’s just grossly unfair to the fans, since that’s a virtual “death penalty.”

Jack Wishard
Los Angeles

The needs of the two outweigh the needs of the many. The Clippers gave up future MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Danilo Gallinari, 10 first-round draft picks, two first-round draft swaps and $30 million. For Kawhi and his demand to sign Paul George.

Russell Hosaka
Torrance

Columnist Bill Plaschke asks the question, ”How can any of the Clippers partners or sponsors or fans trust this team with their dollars or their time or their affection after they were apparently caught knowingly breaking one of the NBA’s cardinal rules?”

The answer is that, just as was the case with the cheating Houston Astros, just as was the case when the MLB canceled the World Series, just as was the case with Tom Brady and the deflated footballs, the fans will soon forgive, forget and return, because we as a nation have come to expect and accept corrupt behavior at every level of nearly every industry.

Bill Waxman
Simi Valley

Hardly a Sterling performance for the Clippers’ owner!

Jack Wolf
Los Angeles

What am I missing here? The Times has reported that Forbes valued the Angels at $2.9 billion, yet Stan Kroenke has offered Arte Moreno $4 billion to purchase the team and its related assets. One can understand overpaying by a bit to acquire something special, but overpaying by more than a billion dollars is highly questionable.

James Regan
Carlsbad

Once the signatures are done and the deal to buy the Angels is completed by Stan Kroenke, his first act as the new owner should be to change the club’s name back to Anaheim Angels or California Angels. That would set things right again.

Stephen Mirkin
North Hollywood

Last Tuesday morning I texted my 18-year-old cousin — whose family has been Angels’ season-ticket holders since 1986 — to let him know of the sale of the Angels by Arte Moreno.

He responded back quickly “best day ever!” To put things in perspective, the Angels last won a playoff game in 2009, when he was 1. Yes, there is joy in Orange County.

Ken Feldman
Tarzana

As a lifelong Angels fan, I am thrilled about the sale of the Angels to Stan Kroenke. He knows how to put the right people in the right positions and let them do their job. He has proven that.

I only have two requests. Please keep the current local announcers. They have been loyal and always looked at the glass half full during the last decade of constant losing. Please also keep the prices affordable. As a comparison, to go to a Dodger game it is at least two to three times as expensive. When you have a family of four, this amounts to hundreds of dollars more per game.

Steve Shaevel
Woodland Hills

A sincere thank you to Arte Moreno. Not for lowering beer prices. Not for the wayward free-agent signings. Not for meddling in personnel decisions. And certainly not for having Mike Trout and Shohei Ohtani together without winning a postseason game.

No, Arte, thank you for finally selling the Angels to someone with a remarkable history of building successful teams. It may be the best thing you ever did for the franchise.

Steve Geary
Corona del Mar

Is Bill Shaikin employed by The Times or the MLB players’ union? All we hear is that ownership stinks (except the spend-crazy Dodgers) and multiple-millionaire players are at risk. One argument he cites against a salary cap is record sale prices for teams. Like anyone with a house whose value keeps rising he should know that such is meaningless until you sell that asset. And right now owners buy teams to keep, not to unload and make a quick profit.

If Shaikin is going to take anyone’s side it should be the fans. Right now many have to choose between attending one or two games a season or having a family summer vacation. Both sides are depending on the fans to absorb the endless salary spiral that ownership passes on to those in the seats. A fraught and unfair strategy.

Mike Dudnikov
Union, N.J.

In reading Mirjam Swanson’s take on USC’s game versus San José State it kind of makes you feel like we shouldn’t even play the rest of the season because the defense is gonna be terrible. Oh my God, was she even at the Coliseum? I was. It was hot! Yes the defense gave up (heat exhaustion?) when it was 42-11 with a lot of second-and third- stringers.

The game was won. No need to pile it on or get anyone hurt. But I’m sure you didn’t see that from the air-conditioned press box!

Phillip Trujillo
Ontario

After USC’s unimpressive 42-26 win over San José State, L.A. Times columnist Mirjam Swanson wrote the following:

“How can you compete for championships if you don’t have a championship defense?”

“They looked thin. And, mostly, like a Riley-era Trojans team.”

“The Spartans should be proud, and the Trojans should be ashamed.”

The tell-like-it-is prose of Swanson is refreshing and appreciating to read.

Wayne Muramatsu
Cerritos

If USC had maintained its traditional rivalry scheduling with Notre Dame this season, they would have sold out the Coliseum on Thanksgiving Saturday instead of subjecting a sparse August crowd to possible heatstroke. I guess they are counting on a playoff appearance to recover the lost regular-season revenues.

Gerry Swider
Sherman Oaks

USC football announced its attendance at last Saturday’s game was 51,144. In looking at photos from the Coliseum, I sincerely doubt that number. To paraphrase the late great Chick Hearn, “If the attendance was 51,144, many fans came dressed as empty seats.”

Jack Nelson
Los Angeles

Now we know who’s been doing Donald Trump’s crowd size estimates — Lincoln Riley and USC officials!

Brian Gotta
San Diego

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