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Kawhi Leonard's promised side compensation from LACwas $48 million, not $28 million
The $28 million deal was to be paid in quarterly installments over four years, but it was not the only compensation Leonard received. According to a high-level source, Leonard also cut a side deal with Aspiration to receive an additional $20 million in company stock. The stock was to be paid out from Sanberg’s personal holdings in the company over four years. That brought the total of promised compensation to Leonard to $48 million. Around the same time as the Leonard deal, Aspiration was going through its rounds of fundraising. They had raised approximately $600 million, including the previously mentioned $250 million from Oak Tree Capital Management. That number also included a $50 million investment from Ballmer. That investment has been characterized to Boston Sports Journal as having been made with light-to-no diligence.
At this point, the $48 million commitment by Aspiration to Leonard and Ballmer’s $50 million investment stand as two separate transactions. The league is currently investigating whether there is a connection that circumvented salary cap rules. If there is a finding of wrongdoing, it would not be the first violation for Ballmer and the Clippers. They were fined $250,000 in 2015 for offering DeAndre Jordan unauthorized endorsement opportunities.
Sam Amick: Yeah, so you have a bit of a track record where Steve has shown, at minimum, or had a history of coloring outside the lines. Obviously, this is on a much smaller scale than something like this—if it is proven. So, the penalties: The player contract could be voided. Executives could be suspended for up to one year. And it says all team personnel. I need to get clarity on possible player suspensions, outside of a—you know... but these are the extreme measures. There’s a bunch of scenarios that could happen. I had one person sarcastically say to me, “Man, Steve’s going to win here because…” And if I’m predicting—I don’t think this will happen—but they were basically saying: “You’re going to void Kawhi’s contract, get all kinds of salary cap room. The guy has barely played the last couple of years. Any fine you give Steve Ballmer is irrelevant because he’s such a wealthy man.”
Sam Amick: Now Steve Ballmer is not only the sixth-richest man in the world—or at least in the top ten—but a guy who, independent of these issues, is kind of a beloved member of the Board of Governors. He's a net positive for the league and, relationship-wise, has a good rapport with Adam. But this type of situation—which we've got to continue sifting through... We have smoking guns—how much of that smoke applies to real infractions?—this situation is exactly what Adam needs to cut out of the league right now. You cannot have a second-apron luxury tax system that is basically a hard cap meant to level the playing field—to keep the richest of the rich from outspending their competition—and then potentially allow deals like this that, if proven to be the case, are putting money in the pockets of star players on the side as a way to keep them in town.
Sam Amick: Do I think that NBA media—and even at times myself—is guilty of not, you know, jumping into the nitty-gritty? Um, especially, you know, listen—Pablo filing through Chapter 11 bankruptcy documents, and connecting dots between Kawhi’s arrangement with the team sponsor and Steve Ballmer’s relationship... That's old-school sleuthing. And we’ll see where it leads. But it's good work. And yeah, a lot of the media is not going down those roads, for sure.
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Pablo Torre: I can tell you though from the NBA perspective, what I've been told this morning is that it's been a bit of panic over there. I'm told that they did not know about this deal between Steve Ballmer, or at the very least between Aspiration and Kawhi Leonard with the influence of Steve Ballmer according to our reporting being the driving force of it. So yeah, it's going to get a a little messy, Dan, over there I think.
Dan LeBatard: But this has the potential to be the biggest salary cap crime that we've seen. Pablo Torre: Yes. Yes. $28 million. And that, by the way, for the T-Wolves in that era in the '90s, five first-round picks, suspensions for the owner of the team for Glenn Taylor as well as other punishments down the line. But this this as tied into again an ongoing SEC DOJ investigation into fraud by this green bank, this climate change friendly company whose biggest investor or at least the most important, influential, notable investor was Steve Ballmer who put in $50 million of his own money. I mean, this is not merely a story about salary caps or circumvention. This is now a question that the seven sources I spoke to are asking. What else did Steve Balmer know about this?
This termination and it's a termination for cause, which is in the Aspiration endorsement deal. This is in his $28 million endorsement deal. Termination for cause if Leonard is no longer an employee of the team for any reason. And the team capital T is defined as the Clippers. So an endorsement deal that a company does with a player is usually you don't always get the rights to their marks, right? So it's like blank uniforms. And so it doesn't matter whether the player is playing for the Clippers or not. But in this agreement, it's a termination for cause if he's not an employee of the team. For avoidance of doubt, which is what you say in a contract when you want to make sure nobody screws it up. If Leonard is still being paid by the Capital T team, but is a member of another NBA organization or has retired. Either of those instances are a triggering event for termination by the company.
Clippers dismiss allegations: Suggesting Steve Ballmer colluded with Aspiration to funnel money to Kawhi Leonard is absurd
Shams Charania: Clippers statement: Neither the Clippers nor Steve Ballmer circumvented the salary cap. The notion that Steve invested in Aspiration in order to funnel money to Kawhi Leonard is absurd. Steve invested because Aspiration's co- founders presented themselves as committed to doing right by their customers while protecting the environment. After a long campaign of market manipulation, which defrauded not only Steve but numerous other investors and sports teams, Aspiration filed for bankruptcy. Its co-founder, Joseph Sanberg, recently pleaded guilty to a $243 million fraud. Neither Steve nor the Clippers had knowledge of any improper activity by Aspiration or its co-founder until after the government initiated its investigation. Aspiration was a team sponsor for the 2021-2022 and 2022- 2023 seasons before defaulting on its contract. There is nothing unusual or untoward about team sponsors doing endorsement deals with players on the same team. Neither Steve nor the Clippers organization had any oversight of Kawhi's independent endorsement agreement with Aspiration. To say otherwise is flat-out wrong. The Clippers take NBA compliance extremely seriously, fully respect the league's rules, and welcome its investigation related to Aspiration. The Clippers will also continue to cooperate with law enforcement in its investigation into Aspiration's blatantly fraudulent activity.
Pablo Torre: "It’s sad that @PabloTorre didn’t take the time to find out how these scammers pulled off their scam." Uhhhhh.......... @mcuban , did you even watch the episode we reported? It's 80 mins long. We investigated exactly this concept.
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Mark Cuban: I’m on Team Steve Ballmer. As much as I wish they circumvented the salary cap, First Steve isn’t that dumb. If he did try to feed KL money, knowing what was at stake for him personally, and his team, do you think he would let the company go bankrupt ? Knowing all creditors would be visible to the world ? They got scammed by Aspiration, along with many others. Crimes for which they pleaded guilty last week. Scammers do scammy things. They did a $300m sponsorship deal with the clippers in 2021. That’s a HUGE deal. The better the team does , the more value the sponsorship has. It actually makes perfect sense that if they stole money from investors and want the clippers to succeed, why not give stolen money to help keep their best player ? It’s sad that @PabloTorre didn’t take the time to find out how these scammers pulled off their scam. The idea that the default is Ballmer is the bad guy is going to back fire on him.
One former Aspiration employee allowed Torre to air an interview with a voice changer. The person said he or she was shocked to learn that Aspiration had a deal with Leonard. “My reaction was, ‘What the f–?’ I was told these are the major contracts and the major players you really need to be aware of. We went through a litany of really, really, top-tier-name contracts and then, oh, by the way, we also have a marketing deal with Kawhi Leonard, a $28 million organic marketing sponsorship deal with Kawhi,” the former employee said. “And (they said) that if I had any questions about it, don’t, because it was ‘essentially to circumvent the salary cap, lol.’ There was lots of ‘lol’ when things were shared.” The former employee was then asked if he or she ever saw Leonard publicly endorse Aspiration in any way. “Never, not once. The single largest payment to an individual for marketing that Aspiration ever made has completely evaded all press,” the person told Torre. “It’s honestly incredible — nothing, he didn’t have to do anything. It’s amazing. I’m honestly so jealous.”
Marc Stein: The alleged violations in this incredibly detailed @PabloTorre report are staggering and without precedent. The Clippers told Torre any assertion of wrongdoing involving Steve Ballmer or the team is "provably false." A story that has shaken the NBA -- already -- like very few.
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