Donald Sterling Banned from NBA for Life
ANNOUNCER: Doc Rivers has navigated his team through an emotional game and an emotional four days and they end up with a 10-point win.</s>BERMAN: The Los Angeles Clippers, they won last night. What a game it was. Breathing a sigh of relief all around and the team has a one- game lead in the NBA playoff series against the Golden State Warriors happening just hours after the owner, Donald Sterling, was banned for life from the league. Joining us for her debut appearance by the way AT THIS HOUR, Rachel Nichols, host of CNN's "Unguarded." Back with us, Atlanta sports attorney, David Cornwell. Great to have you with us. David, you are a sophomore on the show.</s>BERMAN: 6'10" sophomore -- sorry.</s>RACHEL NICHOLS, HOST, UNGUARDED: I got invited to the table, finally. I'm so excited.</s>PEREIRA: What a conversation to have.</s>NICHOLS: I may never leave.</s>PEREIRA: That's OK. Let's talk about the owners. I think that's what everyone is waiting on right now. The big expectation of how these owners are going to vote. We don't know when it will happen. You get a sense that silver would have polled owners before making an announcement at the press conference yesterday.</s>NICHOLS: This is what's interesting. There's a procedure laid out in the constitution for this. The constitution itself is secret. We don't have the exact language. We know generally they have three days to notify him. Then he has five days to respond. There's a couple week period before they hold the vote. It's an interesting series of steps. The question is can they ride the public outrage of yesterday and today and sort of the next couple of days all of the way to that vote. Adam Silver purposely didn't poll all of the owners. He didn't try to gain consensus before making that announcement. He banned him but the power move was laying it out in public to the owners saying you guys, I challenge you to ban him. Three-quarters of the owners, 75 percent, have to make this vote to make it work. If he polled everyone ahead of time and tried to build consensus ahead of time, we saw Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban said it's a slippery slope. I'm concerned about banning someone or taking away their team for a private conversation.</s>BERMAN: David, I want to talk about what Rachel described as a power move. To me, this reads like crisis management 101. The master class. Every scandal is its own thing. You have steroids. You have concussions in football. You have a lot of issues going on here. Everything is different. Adam Silver in his first months on the job, I mean, he laid down the law right there.</s>DAVID CORNWELL, SPORTS ATTORNEY: He sure did. And, remember, a commissioner is really the steward of the entire sport. He's responsible for everything. Adam had to recognize this is a crisis he must manage. This is a brand he must protect. And by pushing the owners and saying I will urge them and I expect using terms like that, what he was saying, I agree with Rachel, what he was saying, I'm the commissioner now. I expect you to do these things because I think it's necessary that they be done. And I think that we're going to end up seeing a unanimous vote to takeover the Clippers.</s>PEREIRA: So, David, be Olivia Pope, if you would, for a second.</s>CORNWELL: Well, if I were advising Donald Sterling, we wouldn't be in this position.</s>PEREIRA: But now?</s>CORNWELL: If he hired me now, I would tell him the best option for him is to go gracefully. There's an arbitration provision in the constitution and bylaws. These particular provisions regarding terminating a franchise provide that once the three-quarters vote, that's essentially an unappealable decision. After that, two-thirds of the owners could decide to fine him instead but I doubt that that will happen. The NBA has a very well buttoned up administrative process as well as an arbitration process that any court in America is going to honor and keep their hands off. He doesn't have any real recourse in the courts.</s>BERMAN: Rachel Nichols, David Cornwell, thank you so much for being with us. Really appreciate your insight on this. Welcome to the show, Rachel.</s>RACHEL: You're always welcome back.</s>BERMAN: Now to this, when it comes to running for president, a famous face, a famous name really helps so in a match-up between two of the most famous names in politics, who do you think gets more votes? Tweet us "@thishour." We have the answer with the most recent poll coming up later.</s>PEREIRA: Bringing hold and new together. "Star Wars" back to the future with original stars. Check it out. A look at the cast next. But first, here's this week's "CNN Hero."</s>UNIDENTIFIED BOY: Chicken nuggets, French fries, mustard and a milkshake. My daddy ordered the same thing as me. That is my daddy.</s>UNIDENTIFIED GIRL: My son's father, he was murdered. Their bond was just a bond that a lot of kids don't have with their father.</s>ANNETTE MARCH-GRIER, CNN HERO: I love my city. I have lived here all of my life. But people here are having crisis after crisis. I believe that the violence in this city and grief are directly connected.</s>UNIDENTIFIED BOY: I feel sad that somebody hurt my dad.</s>MARCH-GRIER: A child's grief can be very different from adults. They can easily lose their identity and their security. And that shift can be very dangerous.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There you go. Write your feelings. How are you feeling today?</s>MARCH-GRIER: Our program provides that safe place for a child to recover.</s>UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hello. How are you doing?</s>MARCH-GRIER: Our volunteers help the children explore their feelings.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why did you choose red?</s>UNIDENTIFIED GIRL: I was angry when my dad passed away.</s>MARCH-GRIER: And talk about healthy ways of coping.</s>UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Get that anger out!</s>MARCH-GRIER: We teach our children that it's OK to cry. His brother died so he's feeling very, very sad. Grief is truly a public health problem. We've got to address it. Coping is how we deal with our feelings. We're giving families a sense of hope.</s>MARCH-GRIER: We are helping to heal wounds and bring families back together again.