“The journalism could not be more serious in terms of how real the paperwork is. Documentation is the story of investigative journalism, and we have the documentation. When you do not have the documentation, in the absence of the note that says ‘I circumvented the cap, signed Steve,’ you’ve got to go to human sources, primary sources. I’ve given now seemingly an ongoing parade of that… I think this is a matter of whether you’re a serious league.”
Quote 2
“On the question of what do the other owners feel, I can say I’ve spoken to four [owners] who think that it’s absurd that this is something that the NBA would potentially not punish proportionally to the evidence.”
29 comments
There doesn’t seem to be much stopping OKC from going on as long as a decade of terrorizing the rest of the league, especially given Presti and the rest of the organization’s ability to keep acquiring guys and training them up for quality minutes in the playoffs.
The franchise that did things the right way is winning now and seems to be headed to winning for quite a while.
If there’s no serious punishment then other teams are probably doing it on some level and they don’t want to open the floodgates for that. My guess is the NBA is going to drag this out as long as they can and hope they can sweep it under the rug because the reality is there’s going to be outrage at first in the news cycle but people have bills, their families, and just life and eventually they move on. We see it all the time with much more significant events (ex. Epstein files; look at the outrage from a few months ago to where it is now).
It really is a question of whether or not the league is corrupt. And if it is corrupt, what is the point in me watching? I’m someone who has really gotten into the NBA over the last 5-10 years. I love this new generation of stars and I am really excited to watch their careers play out. That said, my continued support of the league rests on whether or not they handle this. It’s obvious to everyone what is going on and if the Clippers aren’t punished appropriately then the competitive integrity of the league is shot and I have no further interest.
I don’t think Stern in any reality would let Pablo do this slow drip reveal day after day teeing off on the leagues seriousness and credibility.
As I said elsewhere, the theory is that Ballmer was trying to buy a championship, which may be true, but I suspect the other owners understand that Kawhi to the Clippers was also vital for trying to finally establish the Clippers as a serious franchise in Los Angeles, especially with their new arena.
We can see now that Kawhi is keeping the Clippers in the conversation every year as a team that one can market to make other owners money as well. Kawhi is not part of a 3-headed superteam that is winning all the rings and rubbing every other franchise’s nose into the dirt as being the little brother.
I just don’t think the rest of the owners are angry that the Clippers cost them a chance to sign Kawhi, because Kawhi was never going to their teams. Kawhi was only ever going to someone like the Clippers or Lakers.
I want to notate that Mark Cuban true is breathing life into this issue, and it cracks me up as I wonder if this is because he lost his role with the Mavs after selling OR if he just doesn’t like Ballmer.
Cuban: You ain’t do this yet, Pablo!
Pablo: WELL, I just dug into it, and….
Cuban: BUT HOW ABOUT YOU NOW SEARCH OVER HERE. I MEAN RIGHT HERE. **POINTS AT PILE OF EVIDENCE**
Mark is acting like he’s arguing with him but to me he’s really just helping Pablo firm up his stances as each retort is responded with more evidence. If the NBA wanted this to die the first thing would be to get a minority owner to shut the hell up, right?
….That’s why I think this hasn’t died yet. Mark hasn’t STFU and he’s not doing so on purpose, which in turn is leading a Harvard-educated journalist to have a field day 🙂
Now I’m at the point where this debacle is starting to get prolonged
Silver has presided over cap circumvention, player gambling, load management, broken all-star game, and a meaningless regular season. At what point does he lose his job?
“This is what we call an orgy of evidence….”.
——— Minority Report
The entire league loses credibility if this is just swept under the rug.
Silver is going to have to do something or the league is a bit of a joke.
Think about it this way: The Lakers and Celtics just got new owners. What is they cry foul and say, “Part of why we bought into this league was it’s commitment to competitive balance and responsible approaches to player salaries. We wouldn’t have bought these teams if we knew the ownership of the Clippers was personally funding shame endorsement deals on the side. We’re worried that our own players will want similar treatment unless this is punished severely!”
And they’d have a point!
Or what if Matt Ishbia says, “Shit……I had to buy out Bradley Beal since he wouldn’t waive his no trade clause. If I’d known I could have just given some of my personal money to United Wholesale Mortgage and they could have signed Beal to a no-show endorsement that only paid him if he wasn’t on the Suns anymore, I’d have done that and been able to trade him.”
The problem is, the punishment will have to be really severe. This is honestly worse that Joe Smith. Joe Smith wasn’t that much of a player. This is a side deal for one of the few impactful players in the league…..when he is healthy and when he is receiving his money.
They’re going to have to make him sell the team, tbh. What else can you do? Take away their picks from 2030-33, make them keep Kawhi’s contract on the books and suspect Kawhi? That’ would fuck the Clippers until like 2035 or so? Guess that means you can forget the Clippers being “LA’s favorite team” until like 2075 at the soonest.
Also, don’t forget that the other owners don’t like that he paid for his own stadium either. Even thought that was good, the owners don’t like that because now other cities will tell them to pay for their own stadiums too.
This newest info today just shows that this was a direct pass thru from Ballmer and the Clippers to Kawhi and that’s after Ballmer went on ESPN and lied about it.
If it was a winning franchise, they would already been given a punishment. The fact clippers did this for no results and a forever injured player is crazy , but that isn’t punishment enough. They keep dragging it out and Pablo will say hold my beer and finish the whole investigation for them lol.
Those 4 teams are 100% small market teams that know if nothing happens to ballmer and the clippers then the rich teams will become madrid/barcelona and the rest will become getafe and shit like that.
And the problem is that their teams valuation would go down if they became a glorified minor league for 4-5 teams.
The NBA have a huge problem with their large markets taking up 90% of the national media coverage. This isn’t just a NBA problem as it’s the same in MLB covering Yankee’s and other large markets. For the NBA if it’s news item about any team not called Lakers, Warriors, Knicks or Celtics they rush through it as fast as they can. Meanwhile if it’s a large market team they will stretch a news item out for weeks if they can.
Why is it only the NFL have cracked the code to make all markets basically equal? How is Green Bay (pop. 101k people) get the same media coverage as the Patriots but god forbid if the best team in the NBA Eastern Conference last year was Cleveland Cavaliers yet they only talk about them as much as a bottom feeder team?
I think the NBA need to force these broadcasters to talk more about markets that deserve the attention based on the quality of the teams they are putting on the court. Stop basing coverage of the teams 100% on television ratings. They have a responsibility to the sport and fans to cover teams based on merit.
The NBA is turning into the NBE (National Basketball Entertainment). It’s way too scripted, players don’t care, the game is barely unwatchable, owners are just in for their pockets, refs are a joke.
I give it another 15-20 years until the Euroleague dethrones it as the best basketball league, especially if the Middle East starts investing.
Ballmer sure was cheap when “trying to save the sonics” yet he can find millions for some washed up fun guy. NBA is trash and has no integrity. WWE type faked ass athletes
I think it’s absurd that they’re still going to throw millions of dollars at Steve Ballmer by letting him host the All Star Game with this much evidence piled up. That they’re going to let Kawhi play most of this coming season while under this pall.
The CBA explicitly says circumstantial evidence is sufficient and there is ***so much*** of it. They really don’t need to spend months on this. Ballmer should be forced to sell the Clippers and Intuit Dome because this isn’t even his 2nd time doing this shit. Kawhi should be banned because this isn’t his 1st time doing this either. The Clippers should lose draft picks as well.
The spinelessness of Adam Silver will be the end of the CBA.
The league is already not serious, see the Luka trade and mavs getting #1
Can Pablo start looking into the validity of the draft lottery?
If this were a different team, the Bucks with Giannis for example, the league would have already terminated his contract and levied the harshest penalty possible. ESPN’s coverage would be a complete 180 from whatever it is Ramona Shelburne was attempting to do and there would be non stop stories about where Giannis would end up.
We already know it’s an unserious league, they gave the mavericks the #1 pick
I love Pablo and his reporting here, but I find the statement that the ultimate outcome/punishment dictates whether the NBA is a “serious league” or not to be a laughable comment.
Anyone who thought the league was squeaky clean before this, and thinks that this has ruined their perception of integrity… that this is somehow some un-erasable stain that makes them feel the whole league is a farce that’s pointless to watch… is frankly a dummy. Anyone who thought that, until this situation, the NBA was clean… is extremely naive. Between the Tim Donaghy reffing stuff that was swept under the rug… to the inconsistent/fast and loose reffing throughout the past couple decades… to the league’s embrace of gambling and blind eye towards the extremely serious danger that betting poses towards game integrity… There is already so much that is not “clean” about the NBA.
It’s a hyperbolic and asinine statement to suggest that this situation specifically is so scandalous that it’s somehow ruining the illusion/perception of the league as a fair and rule-abiding enterprise.
Not to mention that other major American sports have had similar scandals/situations to this one, and been largely unaffected. For example, college football and basketball had improper benefits being handed out to star players for YEARS in direct violation of NCAA rules. Everyone knew it was happening, everyone knew that more powerful/wealthy programs could do it in a way that smaller programs couldn’t… and yet… people still watched. If this was something that actually made people turn off the TV, college sports would’ve been dead a long time ago.
All that’s to say — yes, of course this is a major scandal. And Pablo has done an incredible job uncovering it. But to act like the NBA’s response to this is an evaluation on the league’s integrity, or that it will somehow dictate whether it’s a “serious” league or not… is laughable.
Maybe they’ll call it an “entertainment product” to avoid liability when people sue them for rigging shit
I think this would be the straw that broke me from watching ball. League is fishy enough without this scandal but Silvers alien looking ass sweeping this under the rug would be enough to break me.
Silver should resign. If he continues to downplay it will get much worse.
Very few people have been talking about how “I got scammed” isn’t a real defense. That’s like someone from To Catch a Predator saying, “I didn’t do it because Chris Hansen isn’t a child.”
He’s spoken to four owners but can’t name them because they exist in another dimension
The fact that everyone keeps entertaining this is hilarious. The fbi the ones that did the initial investigation found the parties innocent. Better yet silver and Cuban are literally telling Pablo everything you’re showing us we know already and doesn’t actually show the clippers did anything wrong. This is why Cuban continues to say you’re using a source from a company that was caught doing fraud and instead of actually finding actually transaction records he’s looking at dates and just going oh this is too coincidental. Business men do business differently and payments aren’t always made on time. This is why silver said he wants hard evidence because he’s using sources that was just pleading the fifth.
The only one downplaying this right now are Clippers fans and Mark Cuban. We’ll know soon enough where the league stands on this matter.