This isn’t the government, though. The team is subject to NBA regulations if it wants to do business with the NBA (play against other teams in the league). I suspect that he signed some sort of morals clause when he bought the team and kept it part of the league. Can I refuse to do business with a client whom I dislike personally? For sure.

As far as pushing the price up or down, maybe the intent was just to have it up for sale. Or maybe the thing got far bigger than the people running the circus intended. Who knows?

I wonder if he could theoretically pull the team from the NBA and start a competing league. Does he really own the team, or did he just buy rights to manage it and profit from TV coverage?