For 22 seasons, the Los Angeles Clippers have shared the same venue with the Los Angeles Lakers, living in the shadows of the now 17-time NBA champions.
Now that is all set to change as the Clippers held a groundbreaking ceremony Friday morning to kick off construction for their new arena in Inglewood, CA which is set to open during the 2024-25 season.
The arena—dubbed the Intuit Dome—is reportedly worth up to $1.8 billion, close to the same price that Clippers owner Steve Ballmer purchased the Clippers franchise for back in 2014.
“We needed to say, ‘We’re our own guys. We don’t play in the same place as the other guys. We’re going to have our own identity.” Ballmer said Friday morning.
The Intuit Dome will also hold up to 18,000 seats and will have a design feature called “The Wall” that will consist of 51 row designated fan section, along with a two-sided halo scoreboard.
Ballmer spent years going to different areas for inspiration, as he revealed to ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne.
“There’s 30 teams in the league. There’s 29 others. And we got one that happens to be based in L.A. And we got our fans. We use our expression, ‘LA Our Way.’ And we’re building our own presence, identity. And if the other guys feel a little threatened — the other guys’ fans, I mean; the players are actually a little different deal — but if they feel a little threatened, that’s OK. It means we’re doing good.”
The state-of-the-art arena, approved by the Inglewood City Council back in the summer of 2020, is located just blocks away from the Los Angeles Chargers and Rams arena (SoFi Stadium).
