[USA Today]
LOS ANGELES — Hall of Famer Magic Johnson, probably the most popular figure in this city’s proud basketball history, said he won’t attend another Los Angeles Clippers game as long as Donald Sterling remains the team’s owner.
And one of Johnson’s former Los Angeles Lakers “Showtime” teammates, Mychal Thompson, said he wouldn’t be surprised to see thousands of empty seats Tuesday at Staples Center when the Clippers host the Golden State Warriors in Game 5 of their first-round playoff series, which is tied 2-2.
Outside of Los Angeles, from NBA icon Michael Jordan to current superstar LeBron James to organizations such as the NAACP and the Anti-Defamation League, the reaction was just as loud and unified — condemnation and calls for swift and decisive action by the NBA against Sterling.
That is the response to the public release of audiotapes in which a man said to be Sterling made racist remarks aimed at African Americans and, in one case, at Johnson specifically.
