Hello Halo Board! An Inside Look at the Crown Jewel of the Los Angeles Clippers’ New Home

Photos by Lucas Camacho for THT

Intuit Dome, Inglewood California (The Hollywood Times) 07/22/2024

In the history of mankind, we have had people who have changed the way we have done things. Where would we be if Andrew Carnegie didn’t make steel used to build the skyscrapers we have today? Where would we be if Henry Ford hadn’t revolutionized the assembly line and brought cars to the masses? That’s just a few examples. It’s difficult to imagine a world without people who changed the way we think, such as Madame Currie, Chuck Berry, Bill Gates, and Vin Scully among others. I think the appropriate word for these men and women are game changers. And now Clippers owner Steve Ballmer may join this illustrious group.

On a Friday afternoon, in questionably hot weather, Steve Ballmer and his organization revealed the key component of the new Intuit Dome: the Halo board. The Halo Board is one of the many innovative features of the Los Angeles Clippers’ new $2 billion home. The media got to witness the Halo Board’s many capabilities (some of which didn’t work at the time) and heard from Steve Ballmer himself about the thought process that went into making this.

Winding back the clock to the year 2014, Steve Ballmer was looking for an NBA team that he could call his own. He admitted personally that he thought he got lucky in finding the Clippers; they didn’t need to have a new arena or anything. Six months later, however, his thinking quickly changed: they needed a new arena to call their own. Not surprising considering the other tenant was the highly decorated Lakers. But now the Clippers are out on their own with a new place to call home. Steve Ballmer and his collection of brain trusts got to work on designing this new and improved arena with all of the bells and whistles, as it were. The Intuit Dome is truly a sight to behold. Ballmer expressed particular pride in how the stadium will be doing its part to combat global warming with its green initiatives.

The Halo Board itself, however, remains the biggest talking point. The board is the largest double sided video display ever built, spanning almost a full acre. The Halo board provides a variety of different features, such as showing statistics and analytics from a shot chart that updates in real time. It can also measure how fast players are getting up and down the floor, as well as how often the Clippers run a certain play. There will be an area that shows graphics of the players, real time social media posts by fans, and even a “Steve Cam” that follows Ballmer’s every courtside fist bump and celebration (which should be interesting considering he is one of the more animated and enthusiastic of all the NBA owners). Another interesting feature was something called a “Player 360” mode, which focuses on a player’s stats, bio, and even the charitable foundation that the player supports.  The board spans nearly an acre, equivalent to 38,375 square feet, and boasts 233 million LEDs and it’s was developed by Daktronics.

1 of 7

Ballmer demonstrated this feature using Clippers guard Terrence Mann as an example. Terrence Mann, who was present to witness this possibly historic unveiling, called it “Dope” to see all of his stats and his foundation on display on the mammoth sized Halo Board.

Ballmer also wanted the Halo board to change how fans interacted with the game itself. To that end, the Halo board can also measure how loud fans are screaming, utilizing a system that can narrow the audio level down to a single seat. Another interesting feature that Ballmer demonstrated was all the T-shirt cannons at the top of the board ready to launch free shirts to fans seated literally anywhere in the arena (with possibly more cannons installed in the future).

In addition to having countdown clocks posted around the arena to get fans back into their seats during the games, the Halo Board’s “Enter the Storm” simulation will start the second half of games, complete with the sounds of being caught in the middle of a storm at sea. Ballmer also said that the Halo board is available for performers to use for their concerts. The event was used to announce some of the star-studded musical acts that were coming to perform at the new Intuit Dome. Among the most notable was Billy Joel, who will be performing on October 12th, and Bruno Mars, who will be performing the Grand Opening on August 15th and 16th.

I had the opportunity to shake legendary sportscaster Jim Hill’s hand as he was there to cover this event.  I felt like Lucy in the I Love Lucy episode when they arrived in Hollywood when she said “I KISSED BILL HOLDEN!”

They also had food for us to try like hot dogs, and nachos but I went for the Churros:

However, the one big key takeaway that we can take from the Clippers’ new arena is this: they no longer must share a venue with their big brother, the Los Angeles Lakers. As previously mentioned, it’s hard to share a venue with another team, let alone a team that’s won the NBA Championship the second most amount of times in league history. Add to all the history that has happened here, from the Shaq and Kobe era to the Lakers’ extremely satisfying Game 7 win over the rival Boston Celtics, and it’s no wonder Steve Ballmer quickly realized that the Clippers needed their own place. Now that the Clippers have a venue of their own, they won’t have to cover up all the Lakers championship banners or any of the numbers that have been retired by the Lakers. Some of the staff, who declined to give their names for the record, said they were excited to see how the fans react to the new arena and hope it can enhance the experience of going to a basketball game (they were also hoping for the Clippers to win their first game at Intuit). Yes, the Clippers have a home all to themselves now that they’ve moved out of the arena lovingly nicknamed “The House that Kobe Built”. However, there is one question that will remain and only time will be able to answer it: is this the beginning of the Clippers’ emergence from the Lakers’ shadow?