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Reader senior writer Ben Joravsky riffs on the day’s stories with his celebrated humor, insight, and honesty, and interviews politicians, activists, journalists and other political know-it-alls. Presented by the Chicago Reader, the show is available by 4 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays at chicagoreader.com/joravsky—or wherever you get your podcasts. Don’t miss Oh, What a Week!–the Friday feature in which Ben & producer Dennis (aka, Dr. D.) review the week’s top stories. Also, bonus interviews drop on Saturdays, Sundays and Mondays.
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Chicago Reader senior writer Ben Joravsky discusses the day’s stories with his celebrated humor, insight, and honesty on The Ben Joravsky Show.
CHICAGO, IL – OCTOBER 05: Patrick Sharp #10 of the Chicago Blackhawks greets fans during a “red carpet” event before the season opening game against the Pittsburgh Penguins at the United Center on October 5, 2017 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images)
For different reasons that everyone knows about by now, the Chicago Blackhawks are going to have a completely different broadcast team in 2022-23 than they have in the past. Long-time voice Pat Foley retired after last year and Ed Olczyk is now the analyst for the Seattle Kraken.
We knew that their replacements were coming and they were all announced on Thursday. We all knew that Chris Vosters was going to be the TV play-by-play man. He did some games when Pat was out in 2021-22 and was great.
Troy Murray and Patrick Sharp are both going to be color analysts with Vosters on the call. It is a solid group of people that are going to do a great job.
The best news here is that after dealing with some health issues, Murray is good to go for this season. Being healthy enough to travel and do games is amazing after dealing with cancer treatment. It is going to be fun listening to him go through this 2022-23 journey with the Hawks.
The Chicago Blackhawks announced their great broadcast team on Thursday.
John Wiedeman is going to continue in his role as the radio play-by-play man. He has been doing it for a very long time and has been there for some of the most amazing Hawks moments in their history, including three Stanley Cups.
Colby Cohen is going to be a content analyst for the Blackhawks. Caley Chelios is going to be a broadcast and content contributor. Both of them will certainly work well together providing entertaining analysis during intermissions.
Miguel Esparaza is going to do Spanish play-by-play for the Blackhawks and Jorge Moreno is going to be the Spanish color analyst. Getting Chicago Blackhawks hockey to the local Spanish-speaking community is great for the Blackhawks in every way.
It is definitely all a transition for people who have been listening to or watching games for decades. The team on the ice is changing and the people in charge of bringing the game to you are changing as well. It is officially a new era that is sure to celebrate previous eras in the meantime.
The Blackhawks are probably not going to be very good in Kyle Davidson’s first year. However, love it or hate it, he has a plan to rebuild this team the right way. It might take a while but 2022-23 is a big year for their development and some great entertainers are going to be there along the way.
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS – AUGUST 19: Christopher Morel #5 of the Chicago Cubs reacts after scoring a run against the Milwaukee Brewers during the second inning at Wrigley Field on August 19, 2022 in Chicago, Illinois. (Photo by Michael Reaves/Getty Images)
The Chicago Cubs and the rest of Major League Baseball released their schedules for 2023 on Wednesday. There is something new about this schedule that has never happened before in the history of the league.
For the first time ever, all 30 teams are going to play against all 30 teams. The Chicago Cubs are going to play some teams that they haven’t played very often in their history, including those American League East teams that they have played in 2022.
Everyone was excited about seeing the Chicago Cubs play at Yankee Stadium and Fenway Park. They were equally as excited to see the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox at Wrigley Field. Now, some of those great moments are going to happen more often.
Of course, in addition to games like that, they will still have some of their normalcies involved as well. They will still get their healthy helping of National League Central Division opponents as well. They will also still see other great NL teams outside of the division like the Los Angeles Dodgers, New York Mets, and Atlanta Braves.
The Chicago Cubs 2023 schedule is unlike any that ever came before it in history.
The Crosstown Classic between the Chicago Cubs and Chicago White Sox will still exist too as each team will host the other for two games at their park. It is a great fan-driven rivalry that is sure to be a highlight of the summer.
All of the things that made the old schedules great are still there plus some new wrinkles that are going to make it so much fun. With a schedule like this, the competitive balance around the league will be much improved.
The first game of the season for the Chicago Cubs will also be their home opener. Opening Day at Wrigley Field is on March 30th as the Cubs will take on the Milwaukee Brewers. It will begin a three-game series against one of their biggest rivals.
Their first random American League series will be about a week later when they play the Texas Rangers at home. It is strange to see a schedule like this but it will be better for the league over the long haul.
One of the schedule’s highlights for the Cubs is the two-game series that they will play in London against the St. Louis Cardinals. Those games will take place on June 24th and June 25th. It is sure to be a spectacular scene for Major League Baseball.
The Cubs aren’t going to be world beaters in 2023 but they should be wildly improved from what we’ve seen from them in 2021 and 2022. A big offseason is upon them and that will dramatically increase the excitement for this new type of schedule.
“The companies themselves started the work of legacy,” says Tracie D. Hall, who began the CBDLP in 2019. “It felt like a question was being asked: Who is going to work to raise the visibility of the virtuosity of Black dance in Chicago? Who is called to that kind of stewardship? These companies were already delivering the highest levels of artistic and cultural production. They needed support; they needed others to come together and shout their names, not just to the dance world and the art world, but to Chicago itself.”
Reclamation: The Spirit of Black Dance in ChicagoSat 8/27, 6:30 PM, Millennium Park, 201 E. Randolph, RSVP requested at eventbrite.com, info at chicagoblackdancelegacy.org, free
Galvanized by the findings in Mapping the Dance Landscape in Chicagoland, a 2019 census and analysis of the individuals and organizations that participate, produce, and fund dance in the city, Hall, then director of the Joyce Foundation’s culture program, partnered with the Logan Center for the Arts to create an organization with the mission of advocacy, archiving, capacity building, and presenting Black dance in Chicago.
“We have a history in Chicago of supporting arts and artists, but I didn’t know if we were always supporting Black arts organizations and leaders in the same way, to the same extent, with the same amount of funding, with an equitable amount of fanfare,” she says. “If we aren’t doing that, how do we repair that? And if we don’t repair that, what do we lose? Dance has been one of those art forms to which Black artists in Chicago have made specific and unique contributions but hasn’t always been funded accordingly.”
Did you know? The Reader is nonprofit. The Reader is member supported. You can help keep the Reader free for everyone—and get exclusive rewards—when you become a member. The Reader Revolution membership program is a sustainable way for you to support local, independent media.
Beginning with a cohort of eight dance organizations, the CBDLP intends to expand in the coming years. “I have observed the kind of acceleration that can occur when you try to uplift the sector rather than an individual choreographer or company,” says Hall. “I really wanted to test what that collective impact could look like. And I knew the project would need a home for the companies to be seen, supported, and nurtured. I thought of Logan immediately, because Bill Michel [executive director] and Emily Lansana [senior director of community arts engagement] had already demonstrated their commitment to supporting Black artists.”
Princess Mhoon Credit Patrick Orr
Since March 2021, the CBDLP has been under the leadership of choreographer and scholar Princess Mhoon, an alumna of five of the eight organizations in the CBDLP. “Chicago is my hometown,” she says. “My parents were founding members of Najwa Dance Corps and Muntu Dance Theatre. I came up through the ranks, and I always wanted to find a way to give back to the dance community.”
During her research in Black dance and American performance at Howard University, where she obtained a master’s degree in history, Mhoon says, “I never saw any of the people who taught me. Muntu has been around 50 years; Joel Hall for 48. I learned from all of them, and they were not in the history books. So I did my thesis on Black dance in Chicago. This is American history—how can we ignore it? There’s artwork in museums all across America, books live forever, but dance is visceral, fleeting, in the moment. It’s so easy to forget it. So the Chicago Black Dance Legacy Project is here for all of it: we’re here to help companies grow, to help companies from an infrastructure standpoint, to help artistic growth, and to archive and preserve.”
As the CBDLP grows, Mhoon’s perspective on the past and hopes for the future are expansive. “How can we be inclusive but remain focused on our core values?” she muses. “Black dance is American dance. During the transatlantic slave trade, we’re on plantations, we’re not allowed to dance, we’re not allowed to play music, and we come up with dances like the cakewalk and the juba jig. We’re using the polyrhythms from the drums, we’re communicating with each other, we’re making fun of them, and they think we’re entertaining them. And that’s because of their influence on us and our influence on them. That’s how musical theater started: us taking our social dances to the stage. Tap: Irish and African Americans being in New York together. Some people say, ‘Is there such a thing as Black dance?’ I think so. It’s the cross-pollination of cultures that creates Black dance.”
About Reclamation, Mhoon says, “The companies had had a conversation about wanting to have a concert together in Millennium Park—it’s the realization of their dreams. It feels historic. They’ve shared a stage before but not an audience of this size with this level of support. It has broken the silos between the companies and the different genres of dance; it really fostered the idea of collaboration.”
“I’ve heard them say they don’t think of themselves as islands,” adds Hall. “They understand they share students, audiences, supporters. I think they’ve had a lot of mutual admiration but haven’t always known each other’s organizational goals or what legacy looked like to each of these founders. Now they’re able to watch each other, participate in concerts together, and learn what each company contributes. Artists learn and develop in the company of other artists—that pushes the art form forward. That’s what we see happening before our eyes. We’re seeing Chicago dance advance.”
“The companies themselves started the work of legacy,” says Tracie D. Hall, who began the CBDLP in 2019. “It felt like a question was being asked: Who is going to work to raise the visibility of the virtuosity of Black dance in Chicago? Who is called to that kind of stewardship? These companies were already delivering the highest levels of artistic and cultural production. They needed support; they needed others to come together and shout their names, not just to the dance world and the art world, but to Chicago itself.”
Reclamation: The Spirit of Black Dance in ChicagoSat 8/27, 6:30 PM, Millennium Park, 201 E. Randolph, RSVP requested at eventbrite.com, info at chicagoblackdancelegacy.org, free
Galvanized by the findings in Mapping the Dance Landscape in Chicagoland, a 2019 census and analysis of the individuals and organizations that participate, produce, and fund dance in the city, Hall, then director of the Joyce Foundation’s culture program, partnered with the Logan Center for the Arts to create an organization with the mission of advocacy, archiving, capacity building, and presenting Black dance in Chicago.
“We have a history in Chicago of supporting arts and artists, but I didn’t know if we were always supporting Black arts organizations and leaders in the same way, to the same extent, with the same amount of funding, with an equitable amount of fanfare,” she says. “If we aren’t doing that, how do we repair that? And if we don’t repair that, what do we lose? Dance has been one of those art forms to which Black artists in Chicago have made specific and unique contributions but hasn’t always been funded accordingly.”
Did you know? The Reader is nonprofit. The Reader is member supported. You can help keep the Reader free for everyone—and get exclusive rewards—when you become a member. The Reader Revolution membership program is a sustainable way for you to support local, independent media.
Beginning with a cohort of eight dance organizations, the CBDLP intends to expand in the coming years. “I have observed the kind of acceleration that can occur when you try to uplift the sector rather than an individual choreographer or company,” says Hall. “I really wanted to test what that collective impact could look like. And I knew the project would need a home for the companies to be seen, supported, and nurtured. I thought of Logan immediately, because Bill Michel [executive director] and Emily Lansana [senior director of community arts engagement] had already demonstrated their commitment to supporting Black artists.”
Princess Mhoon Credit Patrick Orr
Since March 2021, the CBDLP has been under the leadership of choreographer and scholar Princess Mhoon, an alumna of five of the eight organizations in the CBDLP. “Chicago is my hometown,” she says. “My parents were founding members of Najwa Dance Corps and Muntu Dance Theatre. I came up through the ranks, and I always wanted to find a way to give back to the dance community.”
During her research in Black dance and American performance at Howard University, where she obtained a master’s degree in history, Mhoon says, “I never saw any of the people who taught me. Muntu has been around 50 years; Joel Hall for 48. I learned from all of them, and they were not in the history books. So I did my thesis on Black dance in Chicago. This is American history—how can we ignore it? There’s artwork in museums all across America, books live forever, but dance is visceral, fleeting, in the moment. It’s so easy to forget it. So the Chicago Black Dance Legacy Project is here for all of it: we’re here to help companies grow, to help companies from an infrastructure standpoint, to help artistic growth, and to archive and preserve.”
As the CBDLP grows, Mhoon’s perspective on the past and hopes for the future are expansive. “How can we be inclusive but remain focused on our core values?” she muses. “Black dance is American dance. During the transatlantic slave trade, we’re on plantations, we’re not allowed to dance, we’re not allowed to play music, and we come up with dances like the cakewalk and the juba jig. We’re using the polyrhythms from the drums, we’re communicating with each other, we’re making fun of them, and they think we’re entertaining them. And that’s because of their influence on us and our influence on them. That’s how musical theater started: us taking our social dances to the stage. Tap: Irish and African Americans being in New York together. Some people say, ‘Is there such a thing as Black dance?’ I think so. It’s the cross-pollination of cultures that creates Black dance.”
About Reclamation, Mhoon says, “The companies had had a conversation about wanting to have a concert together in Millennium Park—it’s the realization of their dreams. It feels historic. They’ve shared a stage before but not an audience of this size with this level of support. It has broken the silos between the companies and the different genres of dance; it really fostered the idea of collaboration.”
“I’ve heard them say they don’t think of themselves as islands,” adds Hall. “They understand they share students, audiences, supporters. I think they’ve had a lot of mutual admiration but haven’t always known each other’s organizational goals or what legacy looked like to each of these founders. Now they’re able to watch each other, participate in concerts together, and learn what each company contributes. Artists learn and develop in the company of other artists—that pushes the art form forward. That’s what we see happening before our eyes. We’re seeing Chicago dance advance.”
“The companies themselves started the work of legacy,” says Tracie D. Hall, who began the CBDLP in 2019. “It felt like a question was being asked: Who is going to work to raise the visibility of the virtuosity of Black dance in Chicago? Who is called to that kind of stewardship? These companies were already delivering the highest levels of artistic and cultural production. They needed support; they needed others to come together and shout their names, not just to the dance world and the art world, but to Chicago itself.”
Reclamation: The Spirit of Black Dance in ChicagoSat 8/27, 6:30 PM, Millennium Park, 201 E. Randolph, RSVP requested at eventbrite.com, info at chicagoblackdancelegacy.org, free
Galvanized by the findings in Mapping the Dance Landscape in Chicagoland, a 2019 census and analysis of the individuals and organizations that participate, produce, and fund dance in the city, Hall, then director of the Joyce Foundation’s culture program, partnered with the Logan Center for the Arts to create an organization with the mission of advocacy, archiving, capacity building, and presenting Black dance in Chicago.
“We have a history in Chicago of supporting arts and artists, but I didn’t know if we were always supporting Black arts organizations and leaders in the same way, to the same extent, with the same amount of funding, with an equitable amount of fanfare,” she says. “If we aren’t doing that, how do we repair that? And if we don’t repair that, what do we lose? Dance has been one of those art forms to which Black artists in Chicago have made specific and unique contributions but hasn’t always been funded accordingly.”
Did you know? The Reader is nonprofit. The Reader is member supported. You can help keep the Reader free for everyone—and get exclusive rewards—when you become a member. The Reader Revolution membership program is a sustainable way for you to support local, independent media.
Beginning with a cohort of eight dance organizations, the CBDLP intends to expand in the coming years. “I have observed the kind of acceleration that can occur when you try to uplift the sector rather than an individual choreographer or company,” says Hall. “I really wanted to test what that collective impact could look like. And I knew the project would need a home for the companies to be seen, supported, and nurtured. I thought of Logan immediately, because Bill Michel [executive director] and Emily Lansana [senior director of community arts engagement] had already demonstrated their commitment to supporting Black artists.”
Princess Mhoon Credit Patrick Orr
Since March 2021, the CBDLP has been under the leadership of choreographer and scholar Princess Mhoon, an alumna of five of the eight organizations in the CBDLP. “Chicago is my hometown,” she says. “My parents were founding members of Najwa Dance Corps and Muntu Dance Theatre. I came up through the ranks, and I always wanted to find a way to give back to the dance community.”
During her research in Black dance and American performance at Howard University, where she obtained a master’s degree in history, Mhoon says, “I never saw any of the people who taught me. Muntu has been around 50 years; Joel Hall for 48. I learned from all of them, and they were not in the history books. So I did my thesis on Black dance in Chicago. This is American history—how can we ignore it? There’s artwork in museums all across America, books live forever, but dance is visceral, fleeting, in the moment. It’s so easy to forget it. So the Chicago Black Dance Legacy Project is here for all of it: we’re here to help companies grow, to help companies from an infrastructure standpoint, to help artistic growth, and to archive and preserve.”
As the CBDLP grows, Mhoon’s perspective on the past and hopes for the future are expansive. “How can we be inclusive but remain focused on our core values?” she muses. “Black dance is American dance. During the transatlantic slave trade, we’re on plantations, we’re not allowed to dance, we’re not allowed to play music, and we come up with dances like the cakewalk and the juba jig. We’re using the polyrhythms from the drums, we’re communicating with each other, we’re making fun of them, and they think we’re entertaining them. And that’s because of their influence on us and our influence on them. That’s how musical theater started: us taking our social dances to the stage. Tap: Irish and African Americans being in New York together. Some people say, ‘Is there such a thing as Black dance?’ I think so. It’s the cross-pollination of cultures that creates Black dance.”
About Reclamation, Mhoon says, “The companies had had a conversation about wanting to have a concert together in Millennium Park—it’s the realization of their dreams. It feels historic. They’ve shared a stage before but not an audience of this size with this level of support. It has broken the silos between the companies and the different genres of dance; it really fostered the idea of collaboration.”
“I’ve heard them say they don’t think of themselves as islands,” adds Hall. “They understand they share students, audiences, supporters. I think they’ve had a lot of mutual admiration but haven’t always known each other’s organizational goals or what legacy looked like to each of these founders. Now they’re able to watch each other, participate in concerts together, and learn what each company contributes. Artists learn and develop in the company of other artists—that pushes the art form forward. That’s what we see happening before our eyes. We’re seeing Chicago dance advance.”
“The companies themselves started the work of legacy,” says Tracie D. Hall, who began the CBDLP in 2019. “It felt like a question was being asked: Who is going to work to raise the visibility of the virtuosity of Black dance in Chicago? Who is called to that kind of stewardship? These companies were already delivering the highest levels of artistic and cultural production. They needed support; they needed others to come together and shout their names, not just to the dance world and the art world, but to Chicago itself.”
Reclamation: The Spirit of Black Dance in ChicagoSat 8/27, 6:30 PM, Millennium Park, 201 E. Randolph, RSVP requested at eventbrite.com, info at chicagoblackdancelegacy.org, free
Galvanized by the findings in Mapping the Dance Landscape in Chicagoland, a 2019 census and analysis of the individuals and organizations that participate, produce, and fund dance in the city, Hall, then director of the Joyce Foundation’s culture program, partnered with the Logan Center for the Arts to create an organization with the mission of advocacy, archiving, capacity building, and presenting Black dance in Chicago.
“We have a history in Chicago of supporting arts and artists, but I didn’t know if we were always supporting Black arts organizations and leaders in the same way, to the same extent, with the same amount of funding, with an equitable amount of fanfare,” she says. “If we aren’t doing that, how do we repair that? And if we don’t repair that, what do we lose? Dance has been one of those art forms to which Black artists in Chicago have made specific and unique contributions but hasn’t always been funded accordingly.”
Did you know? The Reader is nonprofit. The Reader is member supported. You can help keep the Reader free for everyone—and get exclusive rewards—when you become a member. The Reader Revolution membership program is a sustainable way for you to support local, independent media.
Beginning with a cohort of eight dance organizations, the CBDLP intends to expand in the coming years. “I have observed the kind of acceleration that can occur when you try to uplift the sector rather than an individual choreographer or company,” says Hall. “I really wanted to test what that collective impact could look like. And I knew the project would need a home for the companies to be seen, supported, and nurtured. I thought of Logan immediately, because Bill Michel [executive director] and Emily Lansana [senior director of community arts engagement] had already demonstrated their commitment to supporting Black artists.”
Princess Mhoon Credit Patrick Orr
Since March 2021, the CBDLP has been under the leadership of choreographer and scholar Princess Mhoon, an alumna of five of the eight organizations in the CBDLP. “Chicago is my hometown,” she says. “My parents were founding members of Najwa Dance Corps and Muntu Dance Theatre. I came up through the ranks, and I always wanted to find a way to give back to the dance community.”
During her research in Black dance and American performance at Howard University, where she obtained a master’s degree in history, Mhoon says, “I never saw any of the people who taught me. Muntu has been around 50 years; Joel Hall for 48. I learned from all of them, and they were not in the history books. So I did my thesis on Black dance in Chicago. This is American history—how can we ignore it? There’s artwork in museums all across America, books live forever, but dance is visceral, fleeting, in the moment. It’s so easy to forget it. So the Chicago Black Dance Legacy Project is here for all of it: we’re here to help companies grow, to help companies from an infrastructure standpoint, to help artistic growth, and to archive and preserve.”
As the CBDLP grows, Mhoon’s perspective on the past and hopes for the future are expansive. “How can we be inclusive but remain focused on our core values?” she muses. “Black dance is American dance. During the transatlantic slave trade, we’re on plantations, we’re not allowed to dance, we’re not allowed to play music, and we come up with dances like the cakewalk and the juba jig. We’re using the polyrhythms from the drums, we’re communicating with each other, we’re making fun of them, and they think we’re entertaining them. And that’s because of their influence on us and our influence on them. That’s how musical theater started: us taking our social dances to the stage. Tap: Irish and African Americans being in New York together. Some people say, ‘Is there such a thing as Black dance?’ I think so. It’s the cross-pollination of cultures that creates Black dance.”
About Reclamation, Mhoon says, “The companies had had a conversation about wanting to have a concert together in Millennium Park—it’s the realization of their dreams. It feels historic. They’ve shared a stage before but not an audience of this size with this level of support. It has broken the silos between the companies and the different genres of dance; it really fostered the idea of collaboration.”
“I’ve heard them say they don’t think of themselves as islands,” adds Hall. “They understand they share students, audiences, supporters. I think they’ve had a lot of mutual admiration but haven’t always known each other’s organizational goals or what legacy looked like to each of these founders. Now they’re able to watch each other, participate in concerts together, and learn what each company contributes. Artists learn and develop in the company of other artists—that pushes the art form forward. That’s what we see happening before our eyes. We’re seeing Chicago dance advance.”
INGLEWOOD, Calif. — Steve Ballmer, decked out in a black construction hard hat and yellow safety vest, is standing in a cavernous area where the loading dock of the Intuit Dome will be.
Even though the area is on uneven dirt right now, the LA Clippers owner knows the layout. Ballmer, who visits the construction site monthly, points to where the visiting team’s locker room will be and makes sure to mention one detail in the design plans of the Clippers’ new home.
“As you know, there are back halls in [Crypto.com Arena that connect locker rooms] between visitors,” Ballmer tells ESPN during a tour of the Inglewood construction site in late July.
2 Related
“Yeah, we don’t want that. I’m just going to say that. How about that? We don’t want any back hallways between locker rooms.”
Sorry, Chris Paul, but the NBA’s richest owner isn’t sparing any detail when it comes to his more than $2 billion privately funded arena, scheduled to open for the 2024-25 season. Footing the bill, Ballmer has his fingerprints all over what will be Inglewood’s latest modern sports palace — located across the street from the more than $5 billion SoFi Stadium — with input on everything from the 38,375-square foot halo-shaped LED board to the 640 restrooms (twice as much as any other arena) down to the inches of space between fans’ knees and the seat in front of them.
Ballmer has spent billions on the present and future of the Clippers. He has built an organization poised to compete for the championship this season with Kawhi Leonard expected to return from an ACL injury. The Clippers, though, aren’t just trying to compete with 29 other teams for a title. They have to live and play in a city that has long been a purple and gold town.
LA Clippers owner Steve Ballmer is spending more than $2 billion to privately fund the Intuit Dome. Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images
Ballmer is trying to change that, even if it means planting the Clippers logo in as much pavement as possible. Recently, he and his wife, Connie, celebrated the renovation of 350 public basketball courts, each with a Clippers logo on it, for the current and next generations to play on in Los Angeles. And now he is a couple of years away from giving the franchise its first true home in Southern California, a futuristic L.A. landmark that will be designed to give fans every comfort in hopes of developing an actual home-court advantage.
“I think this’ll be so cool,” Ballmer says when asked if he could have ever imagined the Clippers having their own home after sharing a building in a town that leans heavily toward the Los Angeles Lakers. “And it needs to be. You said this is a Laker town. No. [It’s a] Laker-Clipper [town].
“And someday I want to be able to say Clipper-Laker [town].”
The fist-pumping Ballmer famously gets so excited at games that he has ripped his dress shirt. So it’s a good thing he has a hard hat on during this tour because the giddy Clippers owner can barely remain on his feet when talking about his newest prize — designed to be second to none.
“It’s another statement that says, ‘Hey look, we’re nobody’s little brother,'” Ballmer says. “We’re a real team.”
WHILE THE CONCRETE frame foundation is in, there is one area where steel beams rise up and outward. Here, there is a black and white sign to indicate the landmark of one of Ballmer’s favorite features — “The Wall.”
Ballmer likes to refer to this as “the wall of sound,” where 5,000 fans will fill 51 uninterrupted rows to give the Intuit Dome a student section fieldhouse-feel. The Clippers even brought in sound experts from The Forum — which Ballmer purchased for $400 million from Madison Square Garden Company to clear the path to build the Intuit Dome — to enhance acoustics and make The Wall as formidable of a home-court advantage as possible.
Ballmer has gone over digital renderings of The Wall, but now he can see it coming to life. At the bottom of The Wall is the outline of one baseline marked in green where the basketball court is supposed to be drawn into the dirt ground.
Looking up toward the steel beams, Ballmer envisions what he wants to see and hear from not just the 18,000 fans that will be in attendance but this specific area.
“You just look 51 rows straight up, literally stands all the way to here,” Ballmer says as he points upward from the baseline where his courtside seat will be underneath a basket.
“‘Clips!” Ballmer shouts, deepening his voice. “‘Let’s go Clips!'”
Ballmer and Clippers executives visited at least 16 NBA arenas and venues overseas in Europe. Members of the organization went to places such as Utah’s Vivint Arena, where the Jazz have one of the loudest crowds in the league. Ballmer attended regular-season and postseason games in Toronto (Scotiabank Arena), Minnesota (Target Center), Dallas (American Airlines Center), Houston (Toyota Center), San Antonio (AT&T Center), Phoenix (Footprint Center), Golden State (Oracle Arena and Chase Center) and Portland (Moda Center), among other places, to see how loud these buildings get and gather details of what makes players, their families and even their agents feel as comfortable as possible.
“You just copy ideas,” Ballmer says. “These guys have a great practice facility. Copy that idea. These guys have great player space. These guys have family spaces. Very important. Because we want our players to say, ‘Yeah, this is our house. … We literally [will have] a [rehab] pool outdoor because we’re here in California.”
Ballmer has obsessed over details, such as how to get fans to the bathroom or to concessions and back to their seats without missing an in-game moment. He wants fans to be able to select concession items as if they’re picking food from their own kitchen and skip lines by paying with technology designed to create a hassle-free experience. There will be 199 game clocks installed around the arena to let fans know when play will resume.
Since purchasing the Clippers for $2 billion in 2014, Ballmer has tried to give his franchise the best that money can buy. But he hasn’t been able to give his team its own home as it shares Crypto.com Arena (formerly Staples Center) with the Lakers, the NHL’s Kings and the WNBA’s Sparks.
With their own arena, the Clippers won’t have to worry about having to play less-than-desirable 12:30 p.m. weekend games — a source of frustration for Clippers players and coaches — while the Lakers or Kings play at night.
For a team with championship hopes, disadvantages like this can impact a title pursuit. The early starts can draw fewer fans.
Starting in 2024, the Clippers will not only have the best times but Inglewood Mayor James T. Butts believes they will have their own city full of fans. Butts scoffed when asked what it will mean for the Clippers to have their own arena in a city filled with Lakers fans.
“Well, first of all, I don’t even think that’s true,” Butts says last month when he and Ballmer celebrated the completion of the Intuit Dome’s concrete frame. “The Lakers left us [The Forum in Inglewood] and they are in Los Angeles.
“I think we have a plethora of Clipper fans. And I think people are going to be so excited because this is going to be the newest and greatest basketball arena in the world.”
The LA Clippers will move to the Intuit Dome in time for the 2024-25 NBA season. Andrew D. Bernstein/NBAE via Getty Images
AS THE TOUR winds down, Ballmer begins to walk up a wide dirt ramp back to the top when he is asked about the Clippers’ journey toward trying to win a championship.
This will be Year 4 of the Leonard-Paul George era. The result so far has been the Clippers making their first-ever Western Conference finals in 2020-21, but injuries and the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic have delayed their championship hopes.
Leonard hasn’t played in a game since Game 4 of the Western Conference semifinals against the Jazz on June 14, 2021. And George was limited to just 31 games in 2021-22, missing a good chunk of last season because of an elbow injury. After returning late in the season, George was sidelined by COVID-19 for the Clippers’ play-in loss to New Orleans.
“I’m very excited,” Ballmer says about the Clippers entering this season as one of Las Vegas oddsmakers’ favorites to win it all. “I really think we have a very good team. … We want to compete for championships. We were in position two years ago when Kawhi went down. It’s hard without your best player.
“It’s really hard to win an NBA championship,” Ballmer adds. “But we’ve got a guy who’s done it twice. And you need one of those.”
Ballmer also knows his team needs its own home. And in a couple of seasons, he will have that.
Peering out from where the club level will be and looking down toward a chalk dirt outline of where the basketball court will be, Ballmer allows himself to dream about the possibilities of what’s on the horizon.
Most bassists have to be chameleons. It’s more or less in the job description when your instrument can be played upright or electric, be bowed or plucked, and appear in settings as disparate as minimal jazz trios and full-blown symphony orchestras. But few bassists shape-shift as effortlessly and as often as Matt Ulery, a Chicago musician and composer who’s a sideman in so many projects that he sometimes seems omnipresent. Unsurprisingly, Ulery’s output as a composer and bandleader is just as multivalent. Last year’s Delicate Charms: Live at the Green Mill evokes the smoky mystique of the Uptown venue, rendered in a big-boned, romantic idiom, while the studio album preceding it, 2020’s Pollinator, is a rumbustious, blow-by-blow throwback to 1920s swing.
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The music on Ulery’s brand-new Become Giant (on his own Woolgathering label) evolved during nearly five years of performances from a piece he wrote on commission for violinist Nathan Cole of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. It leans more into the harmonies and sensibilities of 20th-century classical, an inspiration evident in the album’s structure: it’s organized suite-style in ten mostly through-written movements (and a coda added later). The unusual instrumentation combines solo violin (Zach Brock), bass (Ulery), and drum kit (Jon Deitemyer) with a string quartet (the Chicago-based Kaia String Quartet). That septet conjures the ultra-decadent sounds of turn-of-the-century Vienna (any Zemlinsky fans out there?) and the impressionistic acrobatics of Ravel’s String Quartet; Brock’s finger-twisting, earthy improvisations cut the sweetness with cathartic tartness. Ulery, Brock, and Deitemyer have gigged together for nearly 20 years, and they recorded as a trio for 2019’s Wonderment (also on Woolgathering). Become Giant pushes their synergy to greater heights while winking at Ulery’s recent output—compare, for example, Kaia’s punchy backing rhythm in the ninth movement of Become Giant to almost identical themes fromWonderment (“Levelled”) or Delicate Charms (“The Arrival”). But while much of Become Giant feels familiar, there are also plenty of twists and turns. Brock muses in the liner notes that the album “allowed me to hear a new sound in my own playing—a sound that wasn’t one or the other, classical or jazz, but just something new.” Become Giant is new, yes, and it’s exhilarating.
Matt Ulery’s Become Giant is available through Bandcamp.
Most bassists have to be chameleons. It’s more or less in the job description when your instrument can be played upright or electric, be bowed or plucked, and appear in settings as disparate as minimal jazz trios and full-blown symphony orchestras. But few bassists shape-shift as effortlessly and as often as Matt Ulery, a Chicago musician and composer who’s a sideman in so many projects that he sometimes seems omnipresent. Unsurprisingly, Ulery’s output as a composer and bandleader is just as multivalent. Last year’s Delicate Charms: Live at the Green Mill evokes the smoky mystique of the Uptown venue, rendered in a big-boned, romantic idiom, while the studio album preceding it, 2020’s Pollinator, is a rumbustious, blow-by-blow throwback to 1920s swing.
Did you know? The Reader is nonprofit. The Reader is member supported. You can help keep the Reader free for everyone—and get exclusive rewards—when you become a member. The Reader Revolution membership program is a sustainable way for you to support local, independent media.
The music on Ulery’s brand-new Become Giant (on his own Woolgathering label) evolved during nearly five years of performances from a piece he wrote on commission for violinist Nathan Cole of the Los Angeles Philharmonic. It leans more into the harmonies and sensibilities of 20th-century classical, an inspiration evident in the album’s structure: it’s organized suite-style in ten mostly through-written movements (and a coda added later). The unusual instrumentation combines solo violin (Zach Brock), bass (Ulery), and drum kit (Jon Deitemyer) with a string quartet (the Chicago-based Kaia String Quartet). That septet conjures the ultra-decadent sounds of turn-of-the-century Vienna (any Zemlinsky fans out there?) and the impressionistic acrobatics of Ravel’s String Quartet; Brock’s finger-twisting, earthy improvisations cut the sweetness with cathartic tartness. Ulery, Brock, and Deitemyer have gigged together for nearly 20 years, and they recorded as a trio for 2019’s Wonderment (also on Woolgathering). Become Giant pushes their synergy to greater heights while winking at Ulery’s recent output—compare, for example, Kaia’s punchy backing rhythm in the ninth movement of Become Giant to almost identical themes fromWonderment (“Levelled”) or Delicate Charms (“The Arrival”). But while much of Become Giant feels familiar, there are also plenty of twists and turns. Brock muses in the liner notes that the album “allowed me to hear a new sound in my own playing—a sound that wasn’t one or the other, classical or jazz, but just something new.” Become Giant is new, yes, and it’s exhilarating.
Matt Ulery’s Become Giant is available through Bandcamp.
