Steve Ballmer’s toilets obsession at Clippers’ new arena remains unhinged

The Los Angeles Clippers are finally getting their own arena after sharing a building with the Lakers since the building formerly known as the Staples Center opened in 1999. While the Clippers’ new Intuit Dome won’t be ready until the 2024-2025 season, the team gathered today for a sneak peak at the new place led by an enthusiastic speech from governor Steve Ballmer.

There’s one thing that excites Ballmer more than anything else about the Clippers’ new arena and it’s not the opportunity to get out of the Lakers’ shadow. What really gets Ballmer going is toilets. Ballmer has mentioned the number of toilets and the easy access to said toilets incessantly every time he talks about the Intuit Dome, and that happened again on Tuesday. With Kawhi Leonard, Paul George, Russell Westbrook, and the rest of the Clippers sitting in the front row, Ballmer again got jacked up about toilets.

Toilets! Even Kawhi cracked a slight smile at his boss’ exuberance for so many toilets.

“1,160 toilets and urinals,” Ballmer exclaimed. “Three times the NBA average! We do not want people waiting in line. We want people to get back to their damn seats.”

Listen: as a Chicago Bears fan, I know how annoying it is for a packed stadium not to have enough toilets. The bathroom lines at Bears games take so long to get through that you really do miss a good chunk of the game waiting in them.

Ballmer has been jacked up about these toilets for a long time:

“I’ve become a real obsessive about toilets,” Ballmer shared at the arena’s groundbreaking event back in 2021. “Toilets, toilets, toilets.”

The number of toilets has been trimmed slightly in the last couple years, but Ballmer is still pumped.

The Clippers franchise has never won a championship despite existing since 1970 originally as the Buffalo Braves. Maybe they can hang a banner for toilets? Toilets, toilets, toilets. Three times the NBA average, if you didn’t hear.