kawhi leonard

LAS VEGAS — NBA commissioner Adam Silver reiterated Tuesday night after the Board of Governors meeting that the investigation into whether the Clippers circumvented the salary cap by funneling money to Kawhi Leonard for an endorsement deal he allegedly never fulfilled still is not completed.

Silver said his “timeline remains this summer” to make his findings known after high-powered New York law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz wraps up its investigation and presents the findings to the NBA.

The investigation centers on a $28-million endorsement deal to Leonard from a company called Aspiration that Clippers owner Steve Ballmer invested $60 million into.

With the investigation being about 11 months old, Silver was asked about a timeline for the NBA to announce the results.

“As you know, I am not conducting the investigation, nor is the league office,” Silver said. “It’s being conducted by the Wachtell law firm, independent of the league. Of course, as I have said previously, we all have an interest in wrapping this up and as I most recently said in an interview, that I’m hopeful that it will wrap up this summer so that will continue to be the goal here.”

The Clippers traded Leonard to the Raptors for Brandon Ingram, Gradey Dick, two first-round picks, a pick swap and two second-round picks. Leonard, who spent the last seven seasons with the Clippers, led the Raptors to the NBA championship in 2019. The Raptors then decided to put the trade on hold until the investigation is over.

“And I just want to clarify, so everyone understands, the league did not pause the trade,” Silver said. “The parties that did the trade made the decision not to go forward given that the investigation would remain open and the possible impact on Kawhi or his contract was yet to be known and so they chose not to live with that uncertainty. But, that was well-known before the trade was proposed and I didn’t think there was any reason for people to believe that the status of Kawhi Leonard would change merely because he was traded. The investigation needs to run its course.”

The Clippers have consistently denied any wrongdoing regarding the investigation.

Because of the probable length of the report, Silver was asked about reading such a voluminous amount of information and if things would be resolved before the start of next season.

Silver also didn’t talk about whether Leonard is being investigated for any other side deals.

“I don’t know specifically what will be in the report,” Silver said. “To the best of my information, the report is not done. I do get regular updates from our general counsel, who is Rick Buchanan, and he deals with on a weekly basis on who they are talking to and what they are finding on a preliminary basis. But my understanding is that Wachtell is now in the process of going through the information they’ve gathered and drawing conclusions from that information. And I think, yes, it is realistic to think that this can be wrapped up, and I would say needs to be wrapped up before the beginning of next season.”

Reasons for the Clippers to trade Kawhi Leonard are apparent. So are reasons to keep the seven-time All-Pro forward who turned 35 on Monday.

For now, the team is engaged in discussions and entertaining offers for Leonard, who is highly regarded despite being central to a league investigation into allegations of salary-cap intervention.

Representatives for Leonard, who has one year remaining on a three-year, $152.4 million contract, have informed other teams he prefers to remain with the Clippers and would only sign an extension with the Toronto Raptors or San Antonio Spurs if the Clippers trade him, ESPN reported. Leonard helped both of those teams to NBA titles, the Raptors in 2019 and the Spurs in 2014. He was Finals MVP both years.

However, the Athletic reported that the Dallas Mavericks offered to trade power forward P.J. Washington, shooting guard Klay Thompson and draft picks for Leonard. Mavericks president Masai Ujiri held the same position with the Raptors when they won the 2019 championship.

If Leonard doesn’t agree to a contract extension with Dallas, he essentially would be a one-year rental and not worth as much in trade capital. Ujiri engineered the trade in 2018 that brought Leonard to the Raptors without the player agreeing to an extension, and the result was a championship followed by Leonard bolting to the Clippers.

Another factor in assessing Leonard’s trade value and the Clippers’ motivation to move him is the ongoing NBA investigation involving team owner Steve Ballmer, Leonard and the now-bankrupt sustainable financial technology firm Aspiration.

Triggered in October when the “Pablo Torre Finds Out” podcast detailed a $28 million endorsement contract Leonard received from Aspiration, the NBA hired a prominent law firm to conduct the probe. Findings could be announced soon because NBA commissioner Adam Silver said June 2 that it was time to “wrap it up.”

Aspiration had a $300 million, 23-year endorsement deal with the Clippers and Ballmer personally invested $60 million into the company, whose co-founder Joseph Sanberg was convicted of two counts of wire fraud and sentenced to 14 years in federal prison. Ballmer admits introducing Leonard to Aspiration executives but has denied that he knew details of the endorsement deal that Leonard never fulfilled.

Silver has not stated that the NBA would hold up any trade involving Leonard because of the investigation. Still, the Clippers expressed at the end of the regular season that keeping the 14-year veteran was a priority.

“Our plan is to win with Kawhi,” Clippers president Lawrence Frank said.

Leonard is coming off his best season of six with the Clippers, averaging a career-high 27.9 points over 65 games. He has averaged 20.7 points a game during his career.

The Raptors are rumored to be dangling former Lakers forward Brandon Ingram and first-round draft picks

Even during an early start to their offseason, the Clippers got one major win in May.

The Clippers were the quiet winners of the NBA draft lottery, where, with coin-flip odds, they swiped the Indiana Pacers’ first-round pick in a loaded draft class. The No. 5 pick can add an immediate rotation player for the Clippers while also being a potential fulcrum for what experts consider one of the deepest draft classes ever.

The top four prospects are locked. The only question is in what order Brigham Young forward AJ Dybantsa, Kansas guard Darryn Peterson, Duke forward Cameron Boozer and North Carolina forward Caleb Wilson will hear their names called Tuesday night at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center. Washington, which picks first, Utah, Memphis and Chicago have the first shots at those potential franchise-defining players.

The first round then could turn with the Clippers’ pick.

“It puts the Clippers in an interesting spot at five,” ESPN draft analyst Jeremy Woo said on a conference call with reporters. “They’ve got options, including trades.”

After the top tier of primarily wing prospects, four guards are likely to go in the next wave of picks. Louisville’s Mikel Brown Jr. broke former No. 1 overall pick Cooper Flagg’s Atlantic Coast Conference freshman record with 45 points in a game, but did not play in the NCAA tournament because of a back injury after averaging 18.2 points and 4.7 assists for the Cardinals.

Kingston Flemings (16.1 points, 5.2 assists, 1.8 turnovers) became the first freshman at Houston to earn All-America honors, named a consensus second-teamer last year while leading the Cougars to the NCAA tournament’s Sweet 16. But Houston’s bid for consecutive Final Fours ended against Illinois and guard Keaton Wagler.

The 6-foot-6, 180-pound guard averaged 17.9 points, 5.1 rebounds, 4.2 assists and 1.8 turnovers as a freshman. Coming out of high school, Wagler was the lowest-ranked prospect out of the four guards jockeying for draft position between picks five and eight, but he could be the first of the group off the board.

“He has the size, and he has this brain where you see how quickly he’s improved,” Woo said. “And that, to me, is the biggest thing. But I just think people will continue to learn more about him. He’s not someone NBA teams knew about really coming into the year. … It just happened faster than we all expected.”

Arkansas’ Darius Acuff Jr. has the attention of scouts after averaging 23.5 points while shooting 44% from three-point range, but the 6-foot-3, 190-pound guard could create a defensively challenged pairing next to Clippers point guard Darius Garland.

Garland was acquired in a midseason move that signaled a significant pivot in the team’s plans. The Clippers sent 36-year-old James Harden, who was having his highest-scoring season in six years, to Cleveland in exchange for the 26-year-old Garland and a 2028 second-round selection.

Two days later, the Clippers got even younger by sending starting center Ivica Zubac and third-year guard Kobe Brown to Indiana for 23-year-old guard Bennedict Mathurin, backup center Isaiah Jackson, two first-round picks and one second-round pick. One of the first-round picks turned into this year’s selection after the Pacers, who finished with the second-worst record, slipped out of the top four in the draft lottery.

Zubac, 29, was the Clippers’ longest-tenured player and top rebounder. He and Harden were two of their top three scorers.

Houston guard Kingston Flemings goes for a layup during an NCAA tournament game in March.

(Ashley Landis / Associated Press)

“When we traded James and when we traded Zu, those were incredibly hard and difficult situations,” Clippers president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank told reporters after the season.

“But it requires that you must be honest about yourself and honest about where you’re at as a team. Usually teams, when you study team building, if they’re in this contender status, they usually take this huge drop to rebuilding. We’re not going to do that.”

The Clippers have had 15 consecutive winning seasons, the longest active streak. But they have not won a playoff series since their Western Conference finals run in 2021. Last season ended with a play-in game collapse, the Clippers squandering a 13-point, fourth-quarter lead to the Golden State Warriors at home.

The midseason trades helped the Clippers start replenishing their draft capital after the blockbuster move that brought Paul George and Kawhi Leonard to L.A. in 2019 hamstrung their assets. Because of the Cavaliers trade, the Clippers also have the 52nd overall pick in Wednesday’s second round, along with the 36th pick. The moves also helped reset the roster from the oldest in league history to one with six rotation players who are an average of 25.7 years old.

Leonard, who turns 35 the week after the draft, is entering the final year of his contract. The superstar forward averaged a career-best 27.9 points while playing 65 games, just the second time with the Clippers that he appeared in 60 or more in a season.

But the franchise still is waiting for the results of a league investigation into alleged salary cap circumvention involving Leonard and former team sponsor Aspiration. The punishment levied could include multimillion-dollar fines, a loss of future draft picks or voiding Leonard’s contract with the team.

The sentencing of Aspiration co-founder Joseph Sanberg to 14 years in federal prison on Monday brings the NBA a step closer to concluding its nine-month investigation into the Clippers allegedly circumventing the salary cap.

Sanberg pleaded guilty in October to federal charges of conspiring to bilk investors out of $248 million for portraying the now-defunct Aspiration as a “socially-conscious and sustainable banking services and investment products” firm.

The NBA has declined to comment on the status of the probe centered on $60 million invested in Aspiration by Clippers owner Steve Ballmer and the $28-million contract Clippers star Kawhi Leonard signed with Aspiration for endorsement and marketing work that he never delivered.

Players are allowed to have separate endorsement and other business deals, but at issue is whether the Clippers participated in arranging the side deal beyond simply introducing Aspiration executives to Leonard. Doing so would be a violation of Article 13 of the NBA collective bargaining agreement, punishable by a $4.5-million fine, the loss of a first-round draft pick and the voiding of Leonard’s contract.

The NBA draft takes place June 23-24 and the Clippers have three picks, including the fifth overall selection. The league is not expected to release its findings until after the NBA Finals, which begin Wednesday between the New York Knicks and San Antonio Spurs.

Clippers officials haven’t commented on the investigation. But Leonard, who has one year left on a three-year, $149.5-million contract that will pay him $50.3 million next season, told The Athletic after the Clippers’ season-ending game April 15 that “I think we’re going to be in the clear. I’m not stressing.”

Otherwise, among the few public comments about the investigation were letters submitted to federal court judge Stephen V. Wilson ahead of Sanberg’s sentencing by Ballmer and the law firm conducting the probe on behalf of the NBA.

The letter from Dave Anders of Wachtell Lipton stated that Sanberg provided documentation and information helpful to the NBA investigation during two in-person interviews.

“In all our dealings with Mr. Sanberg, both directly and through his counsel, he provided information that was consistent with our review of contemporaneous documents and other evidence,” Anders wrote. “Mr. Sanberg’s cooperation substantially assisted our investigation, including our ability to develop a more complete understanding of key events.”

Ballmer countered by asking Wilson for a stiff sentence in a five-page Victim Impact Statement posted on social media by his lawyer, David N. Kelley.

“Sanberg continues to exploit his fraud of Mr. Ballmer for his benefit, providing information to the NBA in return for a sentencing letter that the league submitted on his behalf,” Kelley wrote. “The reliability of Sanberg’s information is suspect given that he has pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges, and the government has made its own determination that he is not credible.”

Before handing down the sentence, Wilson made it clear that Sanberg’s credibility was questionable.

“He portrays himself as a do-gooder who was in business to help the world, but he did personally gain from his fraud,” Wilson said, later adding, “I would put the grade of his fraud at the zenith.”

Ballmer, a former longtime CEO of Microsoft who has owned the Clippers since 2014, accused Sanberg of targeting him for his well-known interest in environmental sustainability and exaggerating their relationship to convince others to invest in the fraudulent company. He said he met Sanberg only once.

Ballmer invested $50 million in Aspiration in September 2021. A month later, the Clippers announced a $300-million sponsorship deal with the company. Ballmer nearly granted Aspiration naming rights to the team’s new $2-billion venue as well, but instead chose financial services firm Intuit. Ballmer made an additional $10-million investment in Aspiration on March 9, 2023.

Ballmer was added in November as a defendant in a civil lawsuit against Sanberg and several others associated with Aspiration. Ballmer and the other defendants are accused by 11 investors in Aspiration of fraud and aiding and abetting fraud, with the plaintiffs seeking at least $50 million in damages.

Kelley contended that Ballmer was added as a defendant because of his “visibility and resources,” and portrayed the Clippers owner as a victim, saying “Mr. Ballmer’s losses are not measured solely, or even primarily, on a balance sheet. They are measured in the reputational damage that will take years to remediate, and in the chilling effect on future endeavors intended to do good.”

The lone public comment about the investigation from NBA Commissioner Adam Silver came during All-Star Weekend in February at the Intuit Dome when he described the issue as “enormously complex.”

“You have a company in bankruptcy, you have thousands of documents, multiple witnesses that needed to be interviewed,” Silver said.

The investigation was triggered by reports from podcaster Pablo Torre that Leonard’s sponsorship deal with Aspiration was to circumvent the salary cap. Torre and the staff of “Pablo Torre Finds Out” won a Pulitzer Prize for Audio Reporting for their efforts.