Clippers need to stop fighting NBA and start thinking about their future

The Clippers are furious with the NBA. Steve Ballmer is furious with the NBA. They believe they’ve been wronged, the investigation was biased and the league reached conclusions it wanted to reach.

Fine. Now get over it.

Not because the Clippers necessarily have to agree with everything the NBA found. Not because Ballmer needs to stand in front of a microphone and tell everyone what a terrible person he’s been.

But at some point, this has to stop being about winning an argument and start being about what’s best for the Clippers. Right now, those may be two very different things.

ESPN’s Brian Windhorst made that case Friday, pointing to the Timberwolves’ infamous Joe Smith salary-cap scandal from 2000.

Minnesota initially lost five first-round draft picks, the same number the Clippers just lost. Owner Glen Taylor and basketball boss Kevin McHale initially pushed back.

Then they changed course. Taylor accepted his suspension. The organization stopped fighting. Two days later, commissioner David Stern returned one of Minnesota’s first-round picks. A year later, he gave them another one.

Five lost picks became three. That’s not ancient history with no relevance here, either. Rick Buchanan, now one of the NBA’s top lawyers, was involved in the league’s handling of the Minnesota case and also helped oversee the Clippers investigation, as Windhorst noted.

The Clippers don’t have to surrender tomorrow. If they genuinely believe the NBA did something improper, they have every right to explore their legal options. But what’s the end game?

There is no league appeals process available to them. A lawsuit could take years, cost another fortune and, as Windhorst wrote, would pit the Clippers against a private organization whose constitution gives it considerable authority over its members.

Meanwhile, those five missing first-round picks could cripple the basketball operation for years. That’s the part Ballmer can’t lose sight of.

The Clippers aren’t dead. Assuming their agreed-upon Kawhi Leonard trade with Toronto is completed, they’ll receive two unprotected first-round picks and Brandon Ingram. Their books are in reasonably good shape. They’re still in Los Angeles. There are ways forward.

Perhaps one of them is eventually repairing the relationship with the NBA and asking whether some portion of the punishment can be reconsidered.

Ballmer is worth an almost unimaginable amount of money. He can afford the lawyers. He can afford the $30 million fine. He can afford to fight the NBA until everyone involved is old and gray.

The Clippers can’t afford to lose five first-round picks just because their owner is angry. At some point, somebody in that organization needs to stop trying to win the fight and start trying to win basketball games.