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Clippers for sale? Six potential celebrity buyers.

As the NBA begins the likely messy process of forcing Donald Sterling to sell his team after giving him a lifetime league ban and a $2.5 million fine, a big question looms:  If the NBA and its owners can get Sterling to sell, who will be the new Clippers owner? Several famous names have already thrown their hats into the ring, including sports superstars, titans of entertainment and business, and a former child actor. 

3. Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Oscar De La Hoya

Danny Moloshok/Reuters/File
US boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr.,sits courtside with Donald Sterling (r.) and Sterling's wife Shelly (2nd r.) at a basketball game between the Chicago Bulls and Los Angeles Clippers in Los Angeles in 2011.

Job: Professional boxers (De La Hoya is retired)

Net Worth: $170 million and $200 million, respectively.

What would make them good owners? De La Hoya already has experience with sports ownership, as one of the principal owners of the Major League Soccer franchise the Houston Dynamo, and he is the majority owner of a sports licensing company. Like Johnson, both he and Mayweather would be part of an ownership group. “Me and my team want to buy the Clippers. And we can afford the Clippers," Mayweather told Las Vegas reporters April 29.

"When it comes to business, what better than two minorities? The commissioner wanted to see more minority ownership in the NBA," De La Hoya told USA Today. "If he wants more minorities involved in the NBA, what better than me and Floyd to be part of a potential ownership group?”

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Mark Sappenfield
Editor

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