For months, the Los Angeles Clippers have been embroiled in a massive salary-cap circumvention scandal.
According to journalist Pablo Torre, team owner Steve Ballmer used Aspiration, a now-bankrupt company co-founded by Joe Sanberg — who has since been arrested for fraud — to pay Kawhi Leonard under the table.
Torre has provided multiple smoking-gun pieces of evidence of circumvention, including whistleblower testimony and payment trails, but the NBA is still conducting its separate investigation.
If found guilty, the Clippers face steep penalties, including — potentially — the voidance of the contract. As such, and given his resurgence and health, Leonard has been tangled up in some trade rumors.
However, it looks like Ballmer is willing to die on the Leonard hill. Per ESPN’s Anthony Slater, he won’t be available for trade.
The Clippers don’t want to trade Kawhi Leonard
League sources said Ballmer has maintained a firm stance against a Leonard trade, preferring to continue building around his star forward,” Slater wrote.
Whether the Clippers used the company to move around the cap remains to be seen, though the evidence is quite condemning.
There’s already a similar precedent. The Minnesota Timberwolves were found guilty of circumventing the cap in 1999, with then-commissioner David Stern taking their next five first-round draft picks and fining them $3.5 million
Commissioner Adam Silver, however, doesn’t seem likely to lay the hammer on the league’s wealthiest owner. He’s taken a much more owner-friendly approach, and the integrity of the game hasn’t necessarily been at the forefront of his strategy and priorities since taking over.
Ballmer has connections and power in the league, and the mere fact that he won’t trade Leonard might hint at a rather light punishment for what used to be considered a cardinal sin in the league.
