NEW YORK, NY – APRIL 29: NBA Commissioner Adam Silver holds a press conference to discuss Los Angeles Clippers owner Donald Sterling at the Hilton Hotel on April 29, 2014 in New York City. Silver announced that Sterling will be banned from the NBA for life and will be fined $2.5 million for racist comments released in audio recordings. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)
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The NBA penalized the LA Clippers, Kawhi Leonard and his uncle, Dennis Robertson, for circumventing salary-cap rules.
The Clippers lose five first-round picks (2029, 2030, 2031, 2032, 2033), face a $30 million fine and substantive suspensions of key employees.
The NBA issued suspensions to Clippers owner Steve Ballmer (one year), president of business operations Gillian Zucker (one year without pay) and to the president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank (six months without pay).
Leonard will have to pay the NBA $700,000, and the league has banned Robinson from conducting any NBA-related business for five years.
“The NBA’s collectively bargained system for determining player compensation is a fundamental component of the basketball competition that the league oversees for the benefit of the teams and players and ultimately the fans,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said in a written statement. “I am deeply disappointed by the flagrant violations of our rules and by the Clippers’ institutional and leadership failures that led to this misconduct. The severity of the penalties reflects the seriousness of the violations.”
The NBA hired the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz shortly after the “Pablo Torre Finds Out” podcast reported prior to the 2025-26 season that the Clippers had paid Leonard through a $28 million endorsement deal that he signed in 2022 with Aspiration, which eventually went bankrupt after also having a 23-year, $300 million endorsement deal with the Clippers. The NBA said that the investigation “found a pattern of misconduct and multiple significant rules violations by the Clippers organization.” Shortly after the NBA’s announcement, the Clippers disputed the league’s conclusions.
“We vehemently reject the NBA’s findings, which are the result of a heavily biased investigation seeking to justify a predetermined narrative rather than facts and evidence,” the Clippers said in a written statement. “What the league told us privately differs from what it announced today publicly, and they have not held themselves close to the standard Commissioner Silver set at the start of this investigation to ensure it’s fairness and accuracy. For the past year, we cooperated fully and in good faith and we will now fight just as hard to demonstrate our innocence. We intend to vigorously challenge these findings and penalties through every avenue available to us and look forward to an ethical and impartial arbitration process.”
LOS ANGELES, CA – MAY 11: Steve Ballmer (L) and NBA Commissioner Adam Silver attends an NBA playoff game between the Oklahoma City Thunder and the Los Angeles Clippers at Staples Center on May 11, 2014 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Noel Vasquez/GC Images)
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The NBA concluded the Clippers broke the rules in various ways.
The NBA determined that the Clippers initiated and facilitated endorsement deals for Leonard with Aspiration, Boingo Wireless, Daktronics and Lockton Insurance. It said that the Clippers paid personal expenses for Leonard and his representatives and that it failed to report improper solicitations that Robertson made on Leonard’s behalf.
The NBA determined that Ballmer knowingly sought to help Leonard land endorsement deals, which included approving a business deal that he knew was a precondition for Aspiration to enter an endorsement agreement with Leonard. The NBA said that Zucker was “primarily and directly culpable for the impermissible endorsement arrangements and for providing false and misleading statements to investigators.” The NBA added that Frank had “involvement with the impermissible endorsement arrangements and for approving impermissible expenses” for Leonard and his family.
Lastly, the NBA concluded that Leonard violated the circumvention rules because Robertson pressured “the Clippers to assist him in obtaining off-court income opportunities, successfully obtaining those opportunities, and failing to reimburse payments by the Clippers for personal expenses.”
The Clippers dealt Leonard to the Toronto Raptors in late June for Brandon Ingram, Gradey Dick, unprotected first-round picks (2031, 2033), second-round picks (2030, 2033) and a first-round pick swap (2027) in the deal. It does not appear the NBA will rescind the trade or penalize Toronto in any way.
“Integrity and respect for this game are fundamental to who I am. I accept full responsibility for lapses in judgment by people within my inner circle and regret the distraction this situation has caused the fans and my family,” Leonard said in a written statement through his agent, Harrison Gaines. “I entered into my contract with the Clippers as well as the agreements in question in good faith, fully committed to fulfilling my obligations and with no knowledge of any intent on anyone’s part to circumvent the salary cap. For 15 years, my priority has been giving everything to my family, the game, and those I share the court with. As I return to Toronto, I am focused on what I can control, closing this chapter, and moving forward with a clean slate.”
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