The Most Expensive Fines In NBA History..

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
We've seen players get slapped with $25,000 or $50,000 fines all the time, but it's not every day you see someone get slapped with millions of dollars in fines. Much like fans, investors can get wrapped up into team rivalries, but no investor took their resentment as seriously as Mark Stevens did. Mark Stevens was a minority investor in the Golden State franchise, and during the 2019 finals against the Raptors, Stevens got involved in a player beef when he was sitting court side. Early into the fourth quarter of Game 3, Kyle Lowry jumped into Golden State seats after chasing a loose ball. Any fan who sat close in a live game in basketball knows how confident it could be, and it's generally even warned to fans who buy tickets that close to the court. These things can happen. However, Stevens wasn't amused that the talented point guard jumped into his section. When he tried getting out, Stevens shoved Lowry and even shouted some choice words to him. Lowry was understandably upset and even shouted back to the investor, tried telling the refs. And while nothing happened to Stevens during the game, it was after that a punishment was handed out by NBA executives. Stevens was fined $500,000 and was banned from going to any NBA games for a year. Kyle Lowry received support from Golden State coach Steve Kerr and LeBron James, who posted an Instagram post about the incident shortly after it happened. Lowry remained unhinged about the incident, and he wanted harsher punishment. Stevens released an official apology to Lowry, saying, I take full responsibility for my actions last night at the NBA finals, and I'm embarrassed by what transpired. What I did was wrong, and there's no excuse for it. Mr. Lowry deserves better, and I've reached out today in an attempt to directly apologize to him and other members of the Raptors and Warriors organization. I'm grateful to those who accepted my calls. I hope that Mr. Lowry and others are packed about this lapse in judgment, understand that the behavior I demonstrated last night doesn't reflect the person I am or have been throughout my life. I made a mistake, and I'm truly sorry. I need to be better. I look forward to making it right. Not many people know that players have a contractual obligation to stay healthy when they play for NBA teams. But what's most surprising is if a player knowingly jeopardizes his physical ability by partaking in something dangerous, they can be fined. And one of the greatest examples of this took place with the Lakers in 2007 Vladimir Radmonovic was picked up by the Lakers in the 2005-2006 season as a forward. However, he was injured by the next season after he told the Lakers that he fell on a patch of ice while in Utah during the All-Star break. After feeling guilty about the lie, Vladimir fessed up. The injury actually took place while he was snowboarding there and he fell, which led to a shoulder injury that would keep him out for two months. The Lakers responded by finding him $500,000, or about 10% of his $5.2 million contract with the organization. Lakers executives later released a statement. We discussed internally among our coach, ownership, and management a variety of disciplinary options. I thought this was the fairest and most appropriate action. We consider this a closed issue now, and we look forward to Vlad's return to action. We'll be able to use his talents to help our team. After receiving one of the largest player fines, Vladimir agreed to not appeal, considering he was in the wrong. He stated, It's fair for what I did. The injury was of no surprise to anyone, after he was found that he had never snowboarded before. And considering the Lakers could avoid this five-year, $30 million contract, Vladimir can't consider himself lucky. Dallas Mavericks owner and Shark Tank investor Mark Cuban was fined a ridiculous amount after comments that he made while on Julius Irving's podcast. It wasn't a surprise to fans of the Mavericks, considering Cuban has already amassed over $2 million in fines since he became the organization's owner in 2000 The conversation he had with Dr. J regarded the frowned-upon team practice of tanking, which is when a team purposely loses games throughout the season so they can boost their chances at the NBA's lottery draft picks, which is given to the teams with the worst records. NBA commissioner Adam Silver had instilled a no-tolerance policy for such actions. And as a result, when Cuban said, I'm probably not supposed to say this, but like, I just had dinner with a bunch of our guys the other night. And here we are. You know, we weren't competing for the playoffs. I was like, look, losing is our best option. Mark had no mercy. He even acknowledged the fact that Adam wouldn't have liked the comment when he later said, I don't hate hearing that, but I at least sat down and I explained it to them. I explained what our plan was going to be this summer. Now we're not going to tank again. This was like a year and a half tanking. That was too brutal for me. But being transparent, I think that's the key to being kind of players owners and having stability. It probably didn't help the fact that at the time, the Mavericks were sporting the third worst record in the NBA, which at the time of the Comets was a pathetic 18 to 40 record. After slamming the billionaire with a $600,000 fine, Adam Silver stated that the Comets were a public statement detrimental to the NBA. Cuban later stated that he deserved the fine. After he got a little too excited talking to the All-Star, and vowed to straighten out the team's work environment. I think everybody remembers the controversy that happened in 2014, after Donald Sterling's phone call to his mistress was released to TMZ that exposed him as a racist. The phone call had actually taken place a year before in 2013 to his mistress, Vanessa. The call was in response to Vanessa posting a picture on Instagram of NBA legend, Magic Johnson. Shortly after the photos upload, Sterling called Vanessa saying, it bothers me a lot that you want to broadcast your association with black people. You can sleep with black people, you can bring them in, you can do whatever you want. But the little I ask you is to not bring them to my games. As soon as the comments were released to TMZ, media frenzy surrounded the Clippers owner. And he was quickly catching the eye of nearly every celebrity in the country who quickly hated the comments. Among the celebrities was even former president Obama, who stated, when ignorant folks want to advertise their ignorance, you don't really have to do anything, you just let them talk. Not only did Adam Silver agree with the president and NBA fans, but he also rightly believed that Sterling should be punished for the comments, stating, the central findings of the investigation are that the man whose voice is on the recordings is Mr. Sterling, and that the hateful feelings are those of Mr. Sterling. The views expressed by Mr. Sterling is deeply disturbing and alarming. As for Mr. Sterling's ownership interest in the Clippers, I will urge the Board of Governors to force the sale of the team, and will do everything in my power to ensure that that happens. Silver successfully convinced the board, and justice was served, but Sterling was slapped with a $2.5 million fine, given a lifetime ban to attend any NBA game, and stripped of all ownership interests, which forced him to sell the team. Sterling retaliated with a lawsuit towards the commissioner and the league, although it was a total failure. But eventually, that led to him being stripped of any financial decision. The well-deserved karma forced his wife to step in and negotiate the sale of the team, which she did for $2 billion to ex-Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. Miami Heat owner Mickey Harrison was given a ridiculous fine after comments he made during the 2011 NBA lockout. While the 2011 lockout was in full swing, Harrison felt it would be the perfect opportunity to publish a bunch of tweets that regard the status of negotiations that were taking place between league owners and players. Information that the league feels is on a need-to-know basis, and that need-to-know is within the league itself, not the fans. Harrison disregarded those rules when he responded to a fan tweet that read, How does it feel to be a part of ruining the best game in the world? NBA owners slash players don't give a damn about fans, and guess what? Fans provide all the money y'all fighting over, you greedy pigs. His response was simply, you're barking at the wrong owner, implying that there were other owners that don't care about the fans. However, he's not one of them. Realizing what he was implying, Harrison deleted the tweet less than an hour after it was published. However, the damage had already been done, and word spread fast to NBA executives. And when another fan asked about what his thoughts were on Donald Sterling, he responded again with just a simple LOL. Which to be fair, that tweet did age well, considering Sterling had been exposed as a racist. Adam Silver responded, slapping Harrison with a $500,000 fine, which is the most ever given to a team owner for those type of comments. Michael Jordan, who at the time was the owner of the Charlotte Bobcats, was also given a fine of $100,000 just a few months before for his comments about the lockout. Considering he wasn't the first owner to be fined regarding comments on the lockout, you think he would have steered clear from making any remarks. While the league has always maintained that fighting between teammates would not be tolerated, it really wasn't until the 2000s that fines started to increase, and it helped deter fights before they broke out. After the league had gotten over perhaps his largest fight with Ron Artest back in 2004, the league experienced another just two years later that nearly rivals its insanity. During the final seconds of a Knicks vs. Nuggets matchup, Knicks guard Marty Collins hard fouled former Nuggets guard JR Smith on a fast break attempt. The foul was hard enough to start a confrontation between the two, and as they were shoving, 5'9 Nate Robinson grabbed JR Smith and shouted at him, starting a new fight between them. While the team surrounded the players, Nate tackled JR into the stands. As the fight between Nate and JR was being separated, Carmelo Anthony decided to land a punch on Collins, which knocked him into the ground. A revenge faced JR Jeffreed rushed Carmelo, but was tripped by another player. After the fighting was over, a total of 10 players were ejected. Unlike the artest fight, no fans were involved. However, the fines in that fight make artest fight seem like a friendly scuffle, as the players suspended would miss a combined 47 games, and each organization was fined $500,000 apiece. The fight did little to help clean up the image campaign the NBA was attempting after the artest fight. A team is only as good as its weakest player, but some teams will go to ridiculous lengths just to snag a great player. One of the most notable cases occurred in 1999 with the Minnesota Timberwolves, after they illegally signed Joe Smith. After coming off an impressive college run, Smith was picked up by Golden State in the 1995 draft as the first overall pick. He spent three years with the team, and he was a consistent producer for the team his rookie year. He was averaging 15 points, nine rebounds, a steal, and nearly two blocks per game. A solid producer, but certainly not the same caliber of first round draft he's the league has seen before. His career took a turn for the worse after being traded off to the 76ers in 1998 By the time the NBA's infamous 1999 lockout had corrected itself, he became a free agent. And despite his par performance with the 76ers, the Warriors had approached him once again for contracts that had valued him for over $10 million. The Timberwolves had also approached him, but they were only willing to dish out a little over a million dollars for just a year. However, there was a catch to the contract. As long as Smith kept re-signing one year deals with the Wolves, he would be unofficially promised a much higher contract as soon as the Wolves could afford it. These kind of under-the-table incentives are not only highly shady in the NBA, but extremely illegal under salary cap regulations that teams must follow. The Wolves knowingly still signed them over with the promise. And even though it was a surprise to NBA fans, it really didn't get a second look. That wasn't until partner NBA agents Eric Flusher and Andrew Miller broke off their relationship, which left Miller with both Kevin Garnett and Joe Smith. The feud between the two agents escalated to a full-on lawsuit, which revealed all documents having to do with the contractual agreements for both players. In those documents was the unofficial closet agreement Smith had with the Wolves. And it wouldn't be long until NBA officials would find out. And when they did, Commissioner David Stern made sure an example would be made of the franchise. The NBA ultimately decided to find the Wolves $3.5 million, strip them of their first-round picks for five seasons, and Smith would be stripped of his contract, considering it was illegal, effectively turning them back into a free agent again in 2000 As Smith, who was now an unrestricted free agent, signed with the Detroit Pistons, while the Wolves were left to continue rebuilding a highly regarded dead franchise. This event is one of the greatest reasons why Kevin Garnett's outstanding career at the Wolves never resulted in a successful playoff run, or appearances for that matter. Without the first round picks and cheap contracts dished out to Smith, the Wolves were on their own. Timberwolves executive Kevin McHale talked about the practice after being caught, stating, I haven't read a contract to four or five years. There are eight to ten teams that do this all the time. They're just good at it. We're bad. After practically admitting to knowing about the deal, while also saying he's never read the contract, many officials toyed with the idea of suspending Timberwolves executives. Ultimately, none would be suspended. However, it was an obvious mistake, considering they would risk so much for a player who, at the end of the day, made matters worse. Yo dog, if you don't click on this video on the screen, I'm going to fine you $36, exactly $36, and I'm going to use that money to buy Taco Bell. Now click on this video, bro. What are you doing?