5 Most Damning Facts Against Steve Ballmer and the LA Clippers in Cheating Scandal

Until the NBA emerges with some kind of conclusion from its official investigation into the Los Angeles Clippers' alleged circumvention of the salary cap, the story is going to hover around the organization like Winnie the Pooh under the honey tree.

The pile of circumstantial evidence presented by The Athletic's Pablo Torre now looks like a mountain. And it seems to get bigger every week.

Most recently, Torre reported that the founder of Aspiration—the company allegedly funneling money to Kawhi Leonard in L.A.'s place—received a $1.875 million donation to his charity a year and a half after the Clippers ended their sponsorship deal.

And somehow, that's not even one of the five most damning pieces of circumstantial evidence in play here.

Those can be found below.

5. Another $10 Million

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In case you unplugged from the internet for the last month, a quick catch-up may be in order.

Aspiration held itself out to be something of a green bank that would offset clients' carbon emissions by planting trees. It was a corporate sponsor of the Clippers.

The problem (and a pretty big one, at that) is that Aspiration was a fraud. It didn't do what it said it would. Its co-founder, Joseph Sanberg, pled guilty to wire fraud. The company itself went belly up, and troves of internal documents became public as part of its bankruptcy proceeding.

Cue Torre, who combed through some of those documents and uncovered that Clippers owner, Steve Ballmer, invested $50 million in Aspiration in September of 2021.

The math on that deal was eerily similar to a "no-show job" that Aspiration had Kawhi Leonard signed up for, but we'll get more into that later.

For now, we'll look at a later investment from Ballmer that doesn't look much better.

As Torre has slowly uncovered his investigation over the last several weeks, the Clippers provided a statement claiming that they severed ties with Aspiration during the 2022-23 season.

But with just 14 games left in that campaign, Ballmer ponied up an additional $10 million for the already flailing operation.

According to court documents reviewed by Torre, from the fall of 2022 through the spring of 2023, Sanberg approached 19 different investment firms, looking for an influx of capital for his company. All 19 turned him down. Ballmer, despite his wealth of investment experience, didn't.

On the contrary, as the 2022-23 NBA season was winding down, he made a substantial investment in a company that other firms wouldn't touch.

4. Seven Witnesses

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In the New Testament, Paul told the Corinthians: "In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established."

Pablo Torre has seven.

"Seven employees told me [Leonard's Aspiration deal was in place to circumvent the salary cap]," Torre posted in mid-September. "One finance [department] employee went on tape in Part I [of the docuseries on the matter]. Another went on tape in Part III."

It's not easy to get seven people to agree on anything. And though Torre hasn't been able to name any of these sources, it's fair to assume the NBA and the firm it hired to investigate will interview them.

And while this situation won't be litigated in front of a jury, it can be helpful to think about it as though it would.

If Torre and/or the league were able to put seven witnesses in front of an impartial jury panel and have all of them testify that Leonard's deal was a form of cap circumvention, it might be difficult for Leonard and/or a defense team to overcome.

Those on L.A.'s side have been quick to point out that there's no "smoking gun" yet, but federal courts are typically clear on the value of circumstantial evidence.

Federal (and most states') pattern jury instructions include something along the following lines: "Either can be used to prove any fact. The law makes no distinction between the weight to be given to either direct or circumstantial evidence."

More importantly, the NBA's current collective bargaining agreement, under "Article 13 Circumvention," reads, in relevant part: "A violation... may be proven by direct or circumstantial evidence, including, but not limited to, evidence that a Player Contract or any term or provision thereof cannot rationally be explained in the absence of conduct violative of [these sections.]"

Such rational explanations are getting harder to find with each passing day and week. And that's just based on what's already been made public.

That doesn't necessarily mean the NBA is going to drop the hammer on the Clippers. And any punishment they might receive isn't likely to come until after they host the 2026 All-Star game.

But we've seen enough already to suggest L.A. could (though not necessarily will) face some consequences.

3. The Dennis Wong Investment

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Ballmer owns the lion's share of the Clippers, but a college roommate from Harvard, Dennis Wong, has a small stake in the team. And in December of 2022, he made an investment in Aspiration that now represents a bright, waving red flag.

By that time, the company's long-term prospects were bleak. The walls were closing in. And Aspiration was struggling to make a payment to Leonard's conspicuously named company, KL2 Aspire LLC.

Nine days before Leonard received the $1.75 million his contract promised him, Wong invested $1.99 million. And on the day Leonard received his payment, Aspiration allegedly laid off 20 percent of its workforce.

Again, those numbers are just too close to ignore. And the timing on this one makes it even more suspicious.

2. The Other Celebrity Endorsers

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One of the funniest and most inexplicable angles of this story is that, if we are to believe the Clippers (who've denied any wrongdoing), Aspiration viewed Kawhi as a more valuable celebrity pitchman than the likes of Robert Downey Jr. and Leonardo DiCaprio.

Leonard, who has famously been shrouded in mystery for much of his career, who almost never speaks to the public or the media outside of league-mandated availability and whose most famous moment with the media might be his awkward laugh at a 2019 media day when he was asked to tell Toronto Raptors fans about himself.

One of the least outgoing superstars in recent NBA history was apparently so valuable a salesman that his endorsement deal was reportedly worth more than those of Downey, DiCaprio, Drake and Orlando Bloom combined (all four were also signed to deals with Aspiration).

And again, he didn't do anything to earn that money (outside, presumably, negotiating the sweetheart deal or allowing someone else to negotiate it for him).

No posts online. No retweets. No public appearances. No commercials. Nothing. And he was paid $10s of millions.

1. The $50 Million Investment

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Or, to be more precise, Leonard was supposed to be paid $48 million for his "no-show job" ($28 million in cash and $20 million in stock options).

Ballmer's $50 million investment, in and of itself, is alarming, though maybe not damning. When compared to what was supposed to be directed to Leonard to... literally do nothing... it's hard to ignore how close 50 is to 48.

Then, when you throw in the fact that $50 million is about the difference between what L.A. could give Kawhi and what the Toronto Raptors could give him in 2019 (under the collective bargaining agreement), it's hard to think of many plausible explanations that don't include cap circumvention.

Now, to be fair, the contract Leonard signed with Aspiration didn't come right out and explicitly say, "This is a no-show job." But the outs he was given to avoid work were hilariously broad. And in practice, he truly did nothing for the company.

He was a paid sponsor sponsoring nothing.

Those on L.A.'s side have been quick to point out that there's no "smoking gun" yet. They may be right (though I'd argue the barrels on all of the above are pretty hot), but federal courts are typically clear on the value of circumstantial evidence.

Federal (and most states') pattern jury instructions include something along the following lines: "Either can be used to prove any fact. The law makes no distinction between the weight to be given to either direct or circumstantial evidence."

More importantly, the NBA's current collective bargaining agreement, under "Article 13 Circumvention," reads, in relevant part: "A violation... may be proven by direct or circumstantial evidence, including, but not limited to, evidence that a Player Contract or any term or provision thereof cannot rationally be explained in the absence of conduct violative of [these sections.]"

Such rational explanations are getting harder to find with each passing day and week. And that's just based on what's already been made public.

That doesn't necessarily mean the NBA is going to drop the hammer on the Clippers. And any punishment they might receive isn't likely to come until after they host the 2026 All-Star game.

But we've seen enough already to suggest L.A. could (though not necessarily will) face some consequences.