<\/a>\u2019s $28 million \u201cno-show\u201d endorsement deal with green banking company Aspiration Partners Inc., which also had a $300 million, 23-year endorsement deal with the team. The deal was allegedly for Leonard to make more money under the table. The investigation, which began in September, is led by the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz.<\/p>\nClippers owner Steve Ballmer invested $60 million in Aspiration, but has since denied any knowledge of Leonard\u2019s deal or that a deal with the company was made on his orders.<\/p>\n
Aspiration filed for bankruptcy in March 2025. Earlier this week, Aspiration co-founder Joseph Sanberg was sentenced to 14 years in prison after pleading guilty to two counts of wire fraud for a $248 million scheme to defraud investors and lenders, according to federal officials.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis serial fraudster used his Cinderella-like background, impressive educational credentials, and virtue signaling skills to swindle investors and lenders out of hundreds of millions of dollars,\u201d said First Assistant U.S. Attorney Bill Essayli of the Central District of California. \u201cThis criminal case serves as a warning: Anyone can get duped by a con man.\u201d<\/p>\n
During the 2025-26 season, Leonard averaged 27.9 points, 6.4 rebounds, and 3.6 assists in 65 games played. He also had an outstanding performance throughout the 2025 NBA All-Star Game in San Francisco.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This last season is certainly one of the best of Leonard\u2019s career, and he is contracted to play with the Clippers through 2027. While there have been trade rumors related to Leonard, when it comes to whether the Clippers will move him ahead of next season, his fate remains uncertain.<\/p>\n
When asked about whether the perception of Monday\u2019s developments in the investigation would play a role in his decision about what to do with the Clippers, Silver responded, \u201cI certainly hear and read things all the time about the perception of what really happened or didn\u2019t happen here, and my only reaction is I think I wouldn\u2019t be doing my job if ultimately I issue the determination based on perception.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Scroll to continue reading<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NBA Commissioner Adam Silver gave an update on Wednesday about the investigation into salary cap circumvention by the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":712673,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3789],"tags":[2214,7,92431,559,529,4034,192,4032,251,135,4033,4031,6,66],"class_list":["post-752420","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles-clippers","tag-adam-silver","tag-basketball","tag-bill-essayli","tag-clippers","tag-kawhi-leonard","tag-la","tag-la-clippers","tag-laclippers","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-clippers","tag-losangeles","tag-losangelesclippers","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116692958800352704","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752420","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=752420"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752420\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/712673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=752420"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=752420"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=752420"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}