Hour 1: Clippers Investigation & Ignoring Rules

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So good, so good, so good.

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This is The Michael Kay Show podcast.

**Michael Kay** (0:34)
I gotta get more Kay.

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Listen live weekdays at 1 on the Espn New York app and your smart speaker.

**Michael Kay** (0:41)
And good afternoon, everybody. This is indeed The Michael Kay Show. We thank you for joining us on this Friday, September 4th, 2026 Me and you for two. Those are the rules of engagement, the fastest moving two hours of sports talk radio. And it's fast moving because of you, my esteemed co-host, and you know the membership number 1-800-919-3776.
1-800-919-3776. Now, I did say it's Friday, and you know that means it's a free for all Friday. Whatever you want to know, whatever you want to ask, I am here for you. I'll lead the conversation, you can take it whichever way you like. Now, before we start on today's show, I would like to recap yesterday, which was such a great, great day in our station's history, where we got to celebrate the 25th anniversary of when we became Espn New York. And it was a blast going down memory lane, doing the show with Don for 2 hours, talking about some of the highs and the lows during our time when we were working together 22 years, how we got together. And then the chef's kiss for the whole day. If you haven't seen it yet, I would tell you, if you're a listener to this station, this is what you want to hear, because it's a perfect encapsulation of 25 years. And Alan Hahn and Peter Rosenberg got together. Alan Hahn wrote his own version of We Didn't Start the Fire about all the things that happened in the 25 years, both for the station and in the world of sports in New York. And it is, as the kids like to say, a banger. It is so good. I've listened to it at least four times since I got off the air yesterday. I kind of get emotional because, you know, not only is it a recap, but it's kind of a thumbnail sketch of 25 years of my life. Just had the best time with Don yesterday. Love him. Love working with him. Love those 22 years. They were 22 years I'll never forget. So if you didn't get a chance to join us yesterday, please seek this out on social media. It is so good. Peter did such a great job singing it, putting it together. Alan, I mean, just heavy lifting, working all of that information into that song. Just a great, great job. And they also continued the 25th anniversary with a show of their own, with bringing back people from the past. And just a great job, proud of everybody. And so from looking back, now let's make more memories. Let's start the second quarter century of the station with a free for all Friday. Now, the thing that I wanted to start with, picture, you know, I always call sports the toy store or the candy store. Because there's so many things in the world that are impactful in terms of where we will be in five years or ten years. And what will our money be worth? Stuff like that, you know, real time, real news. Sports is supposed to be an escape from that. Sports is supposed to be, I call it the candy store. But now let's picture this.
You walk into your favorite candy store and there you have it. There's a whole wall of M&Ms and 100 grand bars and Tic Tacs and gum. I mean, it's everything that makes you smile. I mean, I'm not going to name every single candy bar, but I'll tell them the ones I like. Nestle Crunch. So good. I mean, Mounds bars. Love them all. But just know, just know that while you're upstairs in the candy store and you're shopping for all these delicious mind-boggling treats that make you smile, underneath the candy store could be a crap game that's been organized by the owner. Could be an illegal booking situation. There could be thousands of rats under there. Now, you're probably saying, where is Kay going with this? I'll tell you, sometimes I think the people that run the sports world, they're trying to tear it apart in their own devious way. They just are. So the things that were happening yesterday, because Don and I did a retrospective show, we didn't really delve into the things that were going on, the main story yesterday is what was happening with the Clippers and how the NBA came down hard on Steve Ballmer and a couple of executives for illegally fungling money from outside sources to Kawhi Leonard in order to give him more money to come play for the Clippers, as if there was any place that would give him that amount anyway. Steve Ballmer, who's worth like $140 billion, it's shocking to me, because he looks like he'd be the perfect boss of the candy store. Always smiling, laughing, boisterous, screaming at the top of his lungs in joy. But if you believe the investigation that the NBA had on the Clippers situation, it's not so innocent, is it? All of a sudden, you can see the floating crap game underneath the candy store. You can see the rats, you can see the illegal booking operation. So, they find Ballmer $30 million, which, I mean, I use this phrase a lot, but with him, it's true.