Ex-Microsoft CEO likely to buy Los Angeles Clippers for $2 billion

It looks like $2 billion was the magic number — that's the amount that recently retired Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer bid for ownership of the Los Angeles Clippers, the Los Angeles Times reports.

On Thursday afternoon, an attorney for disgraced team owner Donald Sterling told the Times that "there can be no sale without Donald's signature." If accepted — and it still needs to be approved by Sterling, his wife, Shelly, and three-fourths of the 29 other NBA team owners — it would be a record price for an NBA team. The NBA owners will likely allow the sale to go through as long as Ballmer agrees to keep the team in Los Angeles and not move it to Seattle, something he and other investors wanted to do last year with the Sacramento Kings.

Two major bids have been rejected, the Times says: a group that included David Geffen and executives from the Guggenheim Group (owners of the Los Angeles Dodgers) offered $1.6 billion, while L.A.-based investors Tony Ressler and Bruce Karsh proposed $1.2 billion.

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