{"id":816490,"date":"2026-08-20T11:48:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-20T11:48:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/816490\/"},"modified":"2026-08-20T11:48:17","modified_gmt":"2026-08-20T11:48:17","slug":"kawhi-clippers-saga-puts-player-sponsor-deals-in-crosshairs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/816490\/","title":{"rendered":"Kawhi-Clippers Saga Puts Player-Sponsor Deals in Crosshairs"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tThe Los Angeles Clippers<\/a> this week\u00a0asserted<\/a>\u00a0that a team making introductions between players and team partners for potential player endorsement deals not only doesn\u2019t violate any NBA<\/a> rule but is \u201cboth an ordinary practice by NBA teams and a common request of players and representatives.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThat \u201cordinary practice\u201d\u2014which in the past has involved stars such as Michael Jordan and Steph Curry\u2014is likely to become more fraught for teams and star players with intersecting or overlapping sponsor relationships.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Clippers\u2019 assertion came after ESPN reported\u00a0two key points<\/a>\u00a0regarding the NBA\u2019s ongoing investigation into how Kawhi Leonard<\/a> was compensated during his tenure with the team.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tFirst, ESPN says, the NBA didn\u2019t find evidence that the Clippers\u00a0funneled money<\/a>\u00a0to team sponsors, including fintech and environmental sustainability company Aspiration, for the purpose of providing Leonard with additional compensation outside of his employment contract\u2014and no obligation to render services. Second, the league is weighing whether to punish the Clippers for how they supervised employees who made introductions between Leonard\u2019s representatives and those sponsors.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe NBA hasn\u2019t issued a decision on the salary-cap circumvention allegations. It continues an investigation led by league officials and David Anders, a partner at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, whom the NBA retained to probe the Clippers and owner Steve Ballmer<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tIn June, the Clippers agreed to trade Leonard to the Toronto Raptors<\/a>. However, the deal is\u00a0on hold<\/a>, since one possible league-imposed penalty for salary-cap circumvention would be the termination of Leonard\u2019s player contract. In that scenario, Leonard would become a free agent, and the Raptors might lose out on Leonard despite having just traded for him.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe NBA disputed ESPN\u2019s reporting about its findings, writing in a statement that the article contains \u201cnumerous and significant inaccuracies.\u201d\u00a0 ESPN said it stands by the story.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhether ESPN\u2019s reporting proves correct remains to be seen, but the Clippers\u2019 response to the story raises an interesting and important legal question.<\/p>\n

\n\tCan a league restrict opportunities for a business to engage in sponsorship and endorsement negotiations with a team and a player on that team?<\/p>\n

\n\tThis is a dicey topic, because there are businesses that enter into contracts with teams and players on those teams, and the inability to continue doing so could raise antitrust<\/a> law, labor law, intellectual property law, freedom-of-contract and other legal problems.<\/p>\n

\n\tForget the Clippers and Leonard for a moment. Consider when Michael Jordan owned the Charlotte Hornets. Several Hornets players, including Kemba Walker and Cody Zeller, had endorsement deals with Jordan Brand, the Nike-owned company closely associated with Jordan. That might have seemed like a conflict of interest, but it broke no NBA rules.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlso, as\u00a0The Ringer\u2019s Howard Beck\u00a0detailed<\/a>\u00a0last year, online shopping platform Rakuten had a sponsorship deal with the Golden State Warriors and an endorsement deal with Warriors star Steph Curry.<\/p>\n

\n\tMeanwhile, the H-E-B supermarket chain has deals with the San Antonio Spurs and their players. Those arrangements haven\u2019t triggered allegations of \u201cno show\u201d features akin to those reported by journalist and podcaster Pablo Torre. Through\u00a0Pablo Torre Finds Out, Torre\u00a0revealed<\/a>\u00a0suspicious details concerning the relationship between Leonard, Aspiration and the Clippers.<\/p>\n

\n\tSponsor contracts with a team that coincide with separate deals involving an individual player or players occur in other sports, too.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tLast year, longtime Boston Red Sox sponsor Samuel Adams partnered with third baseman Alex Bregman, who played for the Sox, on the release of\u00a0Bregman\u2019s Beer<\/a>. Nike has sponsored the Brazil\u2019s national soccer team and signed an endorsement deal with team star Neymar, and Adidas has supplied Manchester United with jerseys and other apparel while also\u00a0signing<\/a>\u00a0individual Man United players, including Paul Pogba when he played for the club, to endorsement deals.<\/p>\n

\n\tThere\u2019s no shortage of examples of companies entering into contracts with a team and at least one of its players. Those examples haven\u2019t been viewed as controversial or nefarious, but in a post-Kawhi saga world, they\u2019re likely to attract closer scrutiny.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlso at issue are leagues and players\u2019 associations negotiating detailed rules governing the use and licensing of players\u2019 rights of publicity. Those rights protect against the unauthorized commercial use of an athlete\u2019s name, image, likeness, signature, voice, nickname and other commercially valuable traits.<\/p>\n

\n\tTo that point, the NBA and NBPA have a group-licensing arrangement that governs the use and revenue sharing of players\u2019 rights of publicity in broadcasts, video games, trading cards, apparel, equipment and other products officially licensed by the NBA. The arrangement also stresses that players generally retain the right to enter into individual endorsement deals, so long as they don\u2019t conflict with group licensing.<\/p>\n

\n\tIf a team were punished because of communications that contributed to a player on the team signing a deal with a team sponsor, the player could argue that such a move would have a chilling effect on his endorsement opportunities. The player and NBPA might go so far as to argue that the league has suppressed or damaged players\u2019 rights of publicity and freedom to enter into individual contracts.<\/p>\n

\n\tIf that line of reasoning sounds familiar, it\u2019s because it has come up in college sports\u00a0amid controversy<\/a>\u00a0over how the College Sports Commission regulates NIL deals involving college athletes with multimedia-rights companies and third-party brand sponsors that also have business relationships with those athletes\u2019 schools.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tThere, the concern is that schools are using those relationships to enhance their recruiting by facilitating NIL deals and increasing compensation to athletes that border on \u201cpay-for-play.\u201d While that\u2019s a distinguishable fact pattern from pro sports, the underlying concern is comparable: whether restrictions tied to existing business relationships improperly limit opportunities and discourage athletes from pursuing lawful endorsement arrangements.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tBusinesses might also question whether it would be a mistake to partner with a team if doing so could preclude, or at least complicate, the opportunity to sign a player on that team to an endorsement deal. If a business believed a league policy effectively foreclosed opportunities to do business with a team, it might contend that the policy presents an antitrust problem\u2014an unreasonable restraint on commercial relationships that would otherwise occur in a competitive market.<\/p>\n

\n\tIf the NBA punishes the Clippers for how they introduced Leonard\u2019s representatives to team sponsors, expect the punishment to be carefully worded. The league will strive to avoid the potential unintended consequences referenced above. The league will also be mindful that a punishment of the Clippers would set a precedent for other NBA teams and their business partnerships going forward.<\/p>\n

\n\tOne possibility: The NBA reasons that while introductions are generally permissible, the manner in which the Clippers conducted the introductions created the appearance that compensation was being routed through sponsors.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tIf that league goes in that direction, it might contemporaneously issue introduction guidelines\u00a0for other teams, so as to educate them on their sponsorship arrangements and mitigate the risk of potential legal fallout.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Los Angeles Clippers this week\u00a0asserted\u00a0that a team making introductions between players and team partners for potential player…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":816491,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3770],"tags":[20740,7,6264,529,135,6,681,3677,680,476,3820],"class_list":["post-816490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-toronto-raptors","tag-antitrust","tag-basketball","tag-ip-law","tag-kawhi-leonard","tag-los-angeles-clippers","tag-nba","tag-raptors","tag-steve-ballmer","tag-toronto","tag-toronto-raptors","tag-torontoraptors"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/117127682730361822","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/816490","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=816490"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/816490\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/816491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=816490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=816490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=816490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}