Src (paywall) https://www.wsj.com/business/ballmer-clippers-leonard-sanberg-aspiration-49924b19?mod=mhp
In December 2021, Sanberg told a high-ranking Aspiration executive that the Clippers had approached him about doing a deal with Leonard, their injured star. The executive recalled Sanberg saying: “This is important to the Clippers.”
Aspiration executives learned that Sanberg was advocating for a four-year, $48 million deal with Leonard. Sanberg didn’t control such agreements, but as the largest stockholder and a board member, his preferences carried weight.
Inside the company, jaws dropped at the terms, with one executive telling a colleague that Aspiration could purchase seven Super Bowl ads for the contract price.
“If you want a talent deal…maybe we should shop around. Do some research. Consider a different team,” one top executive told Shuckerow, the general counsel, in a text message reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. “You can’t just commit to a $48M spend without talking to people in the company. I don’t get it.”
“Totally agree,” Shuckerow responded. “Kawhi is a regional star. He doesn’t have the charisma of a Steph Curry, Lebron etc.”
CEO Andrei Cherny “judged the deal not to be worth doing.”
Sanberg then agreed to give Leonard shares from his own holdings, telling executives in an email that they would come to see their error: “The benefits that you…will get from this partnership are subsidized by MY $20 million of stock.”
27 comments
This might be my favorite part of this saga yet
Can’t wait to hear how Mark Cuban spins this one.
Nice to see this getting more traction in major publications. I appreciate Pablo getting the scoop and killing it with the follow through, but I also wasn’t aware of him before he first broke the news.
Should’ve listened to the execs now you gotta deal with the drama of him accepting $48M
“In December 2021, Sanberg told a high-ranking Aspiration executive that the Clippers had approached him about doing a deal with Leonard, their injured star. The executive recalled Sanberg saying: “This is important to the Clippers.”
Don’t know if they meant to write it like this, but that is obviously a HUGE detail and accusation.
Cuban typing up an essay as we speak
This is pretty big especially coming from the wsj. Kawhi should be suspended pending investigation, it’s utterly absurd if he suits up for the opener.
“This is important to the Clippers”
So the Clippers DID know about it.
Ah, so the Clippers approached Aspiration about setting up the Kawhi deal? That’s a juicy detail.
I mean they aren’t wrong. I don’t think you could find a less appealing superstar to represent your brand. If you aren’t a basketball fan you have never even heard his name before:
Do you need charisma to do nothing?
Damn, this isn’t looking good for the Clippers. We will see what the NBA finds but considering the reports of Uncle Dennis asking for crazy things during 2019 free agency and the Clippers desperation to compete with the Lakers in LA, this would make perfect sense to happen.
Hopefully the Clippers get a major punishment if they did do it, this opens the flood gates for other teams to circumvent the cap otherwise.
Well they’re getting their money’s worth of attention now
>Jay Rogers, the CEO of a family office contemplating a business partnership with Aspiration, recalled sitting up at the mention of Ballmer’s name. “It was like, ‘OK, this is real,’” Rogers said.
>Sanberg frequently referred to Ballmer as a powerful ally, according to several people who know him through political circles. Sanberg regularly attended Clippers games, sitting courtside.
>He told one political associate that Ballmer had told him that he reminded the billionaire of a younger version of himself. The associate recalled Sanberg saying that he and Ballmer were becoming friends.
>A person close to the Ballmer Group, his investment company, said the two hardly knew each other. He said that Ballmer and Sanberg had their first significant interaction at the press conference announcing the partnership between the Clippers and Aspiration.
Ballmers defense is he was swindled too and barely knew the guy so the league investigation would be figuring out how much of it was pretending to be close with ballmer for clout and what was a real relationship
Its still not clear how the connection was made. Article points towards moves by sanberg in the liberal politics scene during covid doing blm stuff and hiring bernie staff is where he and ballmer were in the same circles but thats not really much to them meeting back then.
Regional star is hilarious lmao
Which region?
This is going to drag out all season or until a mysterious Kawhi retirement.
Suddenly shit got morer realerer
Look guys let’s just believe the billionaires have our best interest in heart and ignore all this
Ballmer pls Venmo me
This was covered in one of Pablo’s episodes. He even had the actual email from Sanberg
> In December 2021, Sanberg told a high-ranking Aspiration executive that the Clippers had approached him about doing a deal with Leonard, their injured star. The executive recalled Sanberg saying: “This is important to the Clippers.”
So you didn’t just make the introduction did you Steve? Interesting……. Yet another lie.
Kawhi Leonard is a popular regional star alright ,the region “A small upper middle class Virginia suburb where 50% of the residents are New Balance Execs”
Are most of y’all like not actually listening/reading the stuff Pablo reported on? This is info from episode 2 which was over a month ago.
It wasn’t even a shock col….
Wait sorry wrong drama, let me connect with Mark Cuban and get my talking points real quick
Cuban getting the meat sweats as we speak
Link doesn’t work and I can’t find the article on NYT anywhere.
Ballmer quick with his law team to take it down.
the evidence is so insurmountable at this point you can already see the media standpoint shifting from claiming the clippers are innocent to claiming that nobody cares, fucking classic