"The report, which arrives courtesy of the podcast Pablo Torre Finds Out, walks us through 80 minutes of exposition explaining how the Clippers and owner Steve Ballmer allegedly helped set up the no-show job through a very well-connected and very vaguely defined carbon credit concern called Aspiration, Inc., a company in which Ballmer himself had invested $50 million. The reason for all this, according to the podcast's reporting, was to help the Clippers circumvent the NBA's salary cap during their free agent pursuit of Leonard."
"Leonard was, according to the scheme, to be paid $7 million for each of four years to endorse Aspiration, which is an odd name if you imagine the alternate definition of "aspirate." In what is maybe the only truly on-brand part of this, the famously private Leonard never did any endorsements. All he ever really needed to do to make the setup believable, and presumably defensible, was to appear in an advertisement or make some kind of public endorsement, maybe once per year;"
The Los Angeles Clippers allegedly arranged a $28 million, multi-year no-show endorsement for Kawhi Leonard through Aspiration, Inc., a carbon credit/tree-planting company. Aspiration later went bankrupt and its co-founder was indicted on federal fraud charges. Owner Steve Ballmer invested $50 million in Aspiration and reportedly helped facilitate the arrangement. The scheme aimed to pay Leonard additional compensation outside NBA salary-cap rules by offering $7 million annually for four years to endorse Aspiration. Leonard never performed endorsements, and he did not even appear in the minimal promotional activities planned, which made the setup highly detectable.
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