2025-26 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

I get why the rule is structured that way. If the player's contract is still for the maximum amount allowed in his particular context under the CBA, you're not technically "circumventing the cap" by offering him some other financial benefit outside the four corners of his contract. Your teambuilding is still constrained to the same extent as if there was no additional benefit. To use your example, say you transferred some billion dollar property in the Serbian countryside full with stables and a mega mansion or whatever to Jokic. If he still signs the max, that means Murray could only get X amount on his next deal, Gordon could only get X amount, etc. But if it was Murray taking like $25 million a year, when guys of his caliber are getting maxes all around the league, yeah then if he's getting some side deal that's clearly cap circumvention.

That's the big difference from the Joe Smith thing. Joe Smith signed a contract that clearly paid him less than he could have gotten on the open market, which granted the Timberwolves greater flexibility in their teambuilding than they should have had.

The counterpoint is that Kawhi wouldn't have signed there without the side deal. I don't know if that's actually true. I kind of think he was always going to the Clippers; for Kawhi, it was the perfect mix of being in Southern California like he wanted and having more endorsement opportunities than he would have in San Antonio or Toronto, but not having to deal with the spotlight of the Lakers. I think we and Toronto were just used for leverage, frankly.

So yeah, I still don't quite know how I feel about this. Like you said, if nothing happens to Ballmer because it doesn't violate this rule it will almost certainly be revisited in the next CBA negotiation.

 

to me, this is huge. like giant. if you interpret the rule as if it doesn't impact max guys, the rule becomes really useless.

the league turned a full blind eye to brunson having a contract negotiated with ny while he was still playing for dallas, so what prevents the lakers from contacting jokic through back channels and arranging for an additional 50 million (100 million?) to find its way to his pocket if he signs with us in FA instead of re-upping with denver in two years?

 

Sam Amick: "Kawhi Leonard's contract could be voided. But this will only benefit Steve Ballmer"
Today, 08:30


Sam Amick commented on the Clippers scandal.
The journalist from The Athletic discussed the investigation into the possible circumvention of the salary cap by the Clippers.

"This situation requires a prompt resolution from Adam Silver. You can't introduce a second tax threshold and at the same time allow such deals where owners line their stars' pockets to keep them.

As a punishment, Leonard's contract could be voided. Club managers could be suspended for a year. This could include any team staff member.

However, one person told me that Steve Ballmer will benefit regardless because this is Kawhi's contract, the guy hardly plays, and they will be able to clear space in the payroll. Any fine doesn't matter due to Ballmer's wealth.

Moreover, he benefits the league and has a great relationship with Silver," the reporter concluded.

 

I love “Horses in Serbia” as a band name.

 

Ballz should be banned from attending any NBA game for a full season. Everyone knows any monetary fine would be a mild slap on the wrist for him.
Robotic Cornrows should be banned as well, without pay for a season.
Man, just when I thought I couldn’t dislike the Flippers anymore, this comes out and I’ve reached a new level.

 

voiding kawhi's contract will just help the clippers lmao

so that's exactly what i expect to happen

 

They should void it while it stays counting on the Clippers' salary cap?

 

MOAR from The Athletic ....

Plenty ‘unusual’ about Kawhi Leonard sponsorship deal: ‘This does not happen’
By Sam Amick
Sept. 4, 2025Updated 5:07 pm PDT
Right about the time the initial reaction to the Kawhi Leonard story was finally dying down on Wednesday, with Pablo Torre’s podcast making a case that the richest owner in all of professional sports — the LA Clippers’ Steve Ballmer — might have circumvented the salary cap and the NBA announcing its investigation as a result, the team that was already in the worst kind of spotlight decided to hop into the headlines yet again.

They sent a second statement.

Following on the 82-word, initial response from the day before, in which the Clippers denied any wrongdoing in Torre’s report while claiming that “any contrary assertion is provably false,” they upped the ante with a 199-word denial that included this line in the third paragraph:

“There is nothing unusual or untoward about team sponsors doing endorsement deals with players on the same team.”

On its face, that is true. But what the Clippers chose not to acknowledge was the suspicious nature of Leonard’s reported contract with the now-defunct former team sponsor, Aspiration, the one that was set to pay him a whopping $28 million over a four-year period in exchange for what appears to be nothing in return and dwarfed deals given to higher-profile celebs like Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert Downey Jr. and Drake who actually provided endorsements. And keep in mind, this statement was released before a Boston Sports Journal report emerged on Thursday alleging that Leonard actually had two deals with Aspiration that could have totaled $48 million combined.

There was no mention in the Clippers’ statement of Ballmer’s involvement in said company, either, the reported $50 million investment from his personal LLC that was deposited approximately three months before Leonard’s deal was done (in April 2022) and two years after a league investigation into Leonard’s free agency should have inspired maximum discretion. No reference to the seven former Aspiration employees who chose to anonymously assist in Torre’s reporting, one of whom shared stories of how the payment of Leonard’s lucrative contract was always deemed a top priority for the finance department — even as the company was careening into bankruptcy — because his infamous and influential uncle, Dennis Robertson, would call to collect.

Amid this latest round of serious accusations lobbed against Ballmer, and with so much at stake in this sensitive situation, the convenient omission of such key facts only worsens the already-poor optics. Especially considering so many of their competitors believe there’s real reason for the Clippers, and Leonard, to be concerned here.


When it comes to the worthiness of the investigation, and the league-wide reaction to the details that have emerged to this point, rival executives who spoke to The Athletic on the condition of anonymity made one thing abundantly clear: No, this is not the norm. The executives were granted anonymity so as to allow them to speak more freely.

For starters, as one pointed out, the combination of Ballmer’s significant investment in a team sponsor and Leonard’s curious contract (or contracts, perhaps) were reason enough to put them in harm’s way with the league. Several noted the size of Leonard’s deal as a red flag all its own — even before the BSJ report, and independent of the fact that he didn’t provide any services in return.

Others wondered aloud if this explained why Leonard, who has historically pushed for every penny in his personal negotiations, would later agree to an extension in 2024 that was below maximum-salary level and afforded the Clippers additional roster flexibility. There was far more shock and dismay than there was apathy or empathy.

“This (sort of endorsement deal) does not happen,” one long-tenured general manager said of the nature of this arrangement.

“I’ve never seen it,” said another executive.

Former Dallas Mavericks majority owner Mark Cuban was among the few who took the opposite stance, defending Ballmer on social media and pointing the finger at the Aspiration co-founder, Joe Sanberg, who agreed to plead guilty last month to defrauding investors of $248 million.

“Scammers do scammy things,” wrote Cuban, who even joined Torre on a follow-up podcast Wednesday night to discuss the matter.

All of these questions coming the Clippers’ way are fair, just as they were six years ago when Robertson’s outlandish requests for illegal perks in free agency — houses, private planes, part ownership of the team, a guaranteed amount of off-court endorsement money, etc. — compelled rival owners to share their concerns with the league.

Many of the same themes that raised suspicions back then remain. And while the NBA didn’t find evidence of the Clippers granting improper benefits, it’s worth remembering that the message sent from the league office should still be seen as a North Star of sorts.

Per my Dec. 23, 2019 report …

(Silver) sees salary cap circumvention as a cardinal sin in the NBA, and will always keep a watchful eye on that front. If any relevant evidence of improper benefits surfaces in the future, the league will re-open the investigation and pursue the charges yet again.

And … here we are.

As Torre and I discussed on the Athletic NBA Daily podcast, we won’t know for quite some time if these accusations stick. There are still many questions left to be answered that will determine whether commissioner Adam Silver drops the hammer, most notably relating to Ballmer’s level of influence within Aspiration or, potentially, in his possible procurement of Leonard’s deal. The Clippers are the ones who claimed at the outset that they could prove these allegations false, and will have every opportunity to do just that.

For Silver, it’s time to pull the curtain all the way back here and finally separate the facts from fiction. You can’t have a luxury tax system like the NBA’s that is essentially a hard cap — a structure designed, in part, to level the playing field with less-wealthy owners — only to look the other way when there’s evidence that one of the richest people on the planet might be finding ways around it. And considering Ballmer already has history here even before the summer of 2019, there should be even more incentive to do a thorough and definitive investigation.

Lest anyone forgets, Ballmer was fined $250,000 by the league in the summer of 2015 for offering DeAndre Jordan a third-party endorsement deal from Lexus as part of the team’s free agency pitch (Jordan reportedly would have earned an additional $200,000 annually). Ballmer addressed that fine with team employees at the time, when his internal memo sent the kind of message that might hold true today.

“We believed we were doing this the right way, and any circumvention was inadvertent,” Ballmer wrote back then. “In our effort to support our players in every way possible, we as an organization must be diligent in complying with the CBA.”

Truer words had never been spoken. Now, we wait to find out if he heeded his own advice.

 

I disagree, I think it makes perfect sense that you can't commit cap circumvention with respect to a player under a max contract because he counts the maximum amount against the cap. The salary cap is about trying to legislate parity of talent, so cap circumvention is about acquiring players by disregarding or manipulating the cap rules.

I think what we're talking about - to what extent third-party benefits are legitimate forms of inducement to sign with a team at all - is a different question. It can still be really bad, but not be cap circumvention. If we want to legislate it, it probably needs a different rule. But I think it would be really hard to legislate because even in this egregious example, there's no smoking gun. In the Joe Smith thing there was literally a paper trail saying we are going to pay you this amount now with a promise of additional benefits. We don't have that here. We have plenty of circumstantial evidence, but what we actually know here isn't that different with stuff that goes on every free agency that everyone is fine with. Without a clear agreement between Ballmer and Aspire to pay Kawhi that money, it's really not different than Lacob hooking KD up with his VC guys or even LeBron coming here and immediately having all these entertainment opportunities.

 

Yeah.. I don't really care that much, about the small market teams either. Chicago could probably absorb another team, the Bay area too.

On another note..I can envision the NBA involving into a truly Global league one day. With NBA North America (the original NBA) South America, Africa East/West, Europe East/West and Asia East/West. With the the Champions of each League, playing in a tournament, for the crown of true World Champion. Basketball will eclipse all sports in popularity one day.

 

you mean like, paying them more than the maximum salary?

 

If the outside arrangement isn't being used to reduce the player's cap number, it isn't cap circumvention. The money Kawhi was getting from Aspire had no impact on how he counted on the Clippers' cap sheet, or their ability to bring in other players while staying under the cap.