ESPN finally released their long-awaited piece of Suns owner Robert Sarver. The Suns, in a preemptive measure, already denied most of the claims and said the reporter Baxter Holmes was just looking to do a hit piece and used disgruntled employees from the past to do it.
It has some wild accusations in it and some that you would expect from any large corporate environment. Sarver has either denied or explained most of the allegations in the story, but if you don’t want to read the entire thing, here is a bullet point version of the whole article.
- Sarver likes to say the N-word a lot.
- Sarver says “Black Guy” a lot.
- Sarver had beef with Rich Paul and Klutch.
- Sarver showed his wife in a swimsuit to staff members.
- Sarver talked about how his wife gave him oral sex to staffers.
- Sarver liked to tell people he owned them.
- Sarver called his black coach Earl Watson “Toxic.”
- Sarver liked to tell staffers he needed MAGNUM condoms.
- Sarver believes women should breastfeed at home not work.
- Sarver thinks women cry too much.
- Sarver asked a male employee if he shaved his balls.
- Sarver offered to get his players escorts if they played better.
- Sarver wanted local strippers to have babies with players so they wouldn’t leave Suns in free agency.
- Sarver pantsed an employee in front of 60 staff members.
- Sarver berates players and coaches after bad losses, including DeAndre Ayton.
- Sarver allowed a black employee to be called Carlton by a white co-worker.
The stripper and escort stories are quite wild.
Here is how it was described.
When the Suns were recruiting free agent LaMarcus Aldridge in the summer of 2015, the team knew that Aldridge had young children in Texas and that playing near them was appealing. During the recruitment, Sarver remarked to two basketball operations staffers that the Suns needed to have local strippers impregnated by NBA players so those players would have children in the Phoenix area and feel obliged to be closer to them, giving the Suns a potential edge in free agency, the now-former staffers said.
“A lot of the stuff he says is to get a big reaction. And who’s going to tell him that he can’t?” said one of the former staffers. “He speaks in threats. He likes that awkwardness. He likes people to know that he’s in charge. He wants control. He wants control of every situation and every person.”
During the 2012-13 season, two former longtime staffers said, Sarver addressed players before they headed to Los Angeles for a game. The team had performed poorly there, and there were rumblings that players were enjoying the nightlife to the point that it was hindering their play. Sarver, addressing the players, offered to fly women to Los Angeles — the implication was clearly sexual — if players promised to be in bed at a reasonable hour before the next day’s game. The gesture wasn’t taken seriously, a former staffer who was in attendance said, but standing within earshot was a female staffer who was mortified.
“He was goofing around,” one staffer who was present said. “But little did he know, standing out in the hallway is one of our women staff members who cares for the family [of players and coaches].”
I have covered sports for a long time, and while this report is damaging, it isn’t Donald Sterling damaging. There is no smoking gun, no recording, no video. I am sure the league will look into it but don’t expect Sarver to be unseated as owner or anything. Especially when the majority of the accusations are race-related. We know racism doesn’t get you fired.
Flip the page for Sarver denying everything.