NBA Finds No Evidence Ballmer Funneled Money to Leonard
Get the Sports newsletter
Daily sports — scores, transfers, the storylines from the leagues you actually follow. Free.
- NBA investigation has found no evidence that Steve Ballmer funneled money through team sponsors to pay Kawhi Leonard, with the league now focusing on whether player introductions to team sponsors constitute a violation of salary cap rules
- Investigation expanded beyond Aspiration to at least three other companies including Daktronics and Boingo Wireless, but sources said the league has found no evidence of Ballmer funneling money through any of them
- NBA operations manual for 2021-22 barred teams from recommending a player to a sponsor as an endorsement candidate but allowed providing contact information, while the league's own 2024-25 deck encouraged teams to facilitate player-sponsor introductions as a 'best practice'
- NBPA sources said an argument that a sponsor introduction constitutes salary cap circumvention 'is dead on arrival,' with the union prepared to take the matter to arbitration if the NBA seeks penalties without sufficient evidence
- Ballmer has told confidants he will not accept any league finding asserting he or the team intended to circumvent the salary cap and would instead bring the matter to arbitration
- NBA lawyers raised the 2000 Timberwolves penalty as a potential template — five first-round picks lost and a $3.5 million fine for an illegal secret deal with Joe Smith — though league insiders called a punishment based on sponsor introductions 'an outrageous overreach'
- Clippers-Raptors trade sending Leonard to Toronto for Brandon Ingram, Gradey Dick and draft picks, agreed June 30, remains on hold because the Raptors would absorb any penalty risk tied to the investigation
Why it matters: With no evidence of direct payments from Ballmer to Leonard, the NBA is leaning on a 'failure to supervise' theory built around sponsor introductions — a practice the league's own 2024-25 best-practices deck encourages and the NBPA already calls 'dead on arrival.' The June 30 Clippers-Raptors trade that would send Leonard to Toronto remains frozen until the probe resolves, leaving Leonard's career and the Clippers' roster plans in limbo while both sides negotiate a settlement or prepare for arbitration.
Ask SkimNews
