{"id":186964,"date":"2025-09-10T02:57:21","date_gmt":"2025-09-10T02:57:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/186964\/"},"modified":"2025-09-10T02:57:21","modified_gmt":"2025-09-10T02:57:21","slug":"kawhi-leonard-had-wild-demands-from-raptors-in-free-agency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/186964\/","title":{"rendered":"Kawhi Leonard had wild demands from Raptors in free agency"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kawhi Leonard\u2019s representation asked for a number of things \u2014 including a stake in an NHL team \u2014 during free agency negotiations with the Raptors in 2019 that exceeded what teams are able to offer, a new report revealed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Toronto Star reported<\/a> Tuesday that Leonard\u2019s uncle and manager Dennis Robertson was involved in negotiations, asked for an ownership stake in the Maple Leafs \u2014 also a property of the Raptors\u2019 parent company MLSE \u2014 as a no-show endorsement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The new report comes as the NBA is investigating whether Clippers owner Steve Ballmer circumvented the salary cap through<\/a> a \u201cno-show\u201d endorsement deal for Leonard with a Clippers sponsor, environmental startup Aspiration.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"LosLos Angeles Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard, right, looks toward the scoreboard during the second half of an NBA basketball game on May 1, 2025, in Inglewood, Calif. AP<\/p>\n

The alleged malfeasance came to light after a lengthy investigation by journalist Pablo Torre<\/a> on his podcast.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ballmer denied any wrongdoing<\/a> in an interview on ESPN last week.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Toronto Star report indicated that Robertson also asked for ownership stakes in outside companies with which MLSE had relationships, while also calling on the Raptors to match at least $10 million per year in additional sponsorship income.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A source also told The Star that Leonard\u2019s camp told the Raptors, \u201cwe don\u2019t want to do anything\u201d in terms of sponsorship commitments.\u00a0Robertson reiterated the point after the Raptors said deals would require appearances or advertising shoots.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"JoeKawhi Leonard in action with the Raptors against the Nets on Dec. 7, 2018. Paul J. Bereswill<\/p>\n

Torre reported last week that Leonard inked a four-year, $28 million endorsement deal with Aspiration \u2014 a Clippers sponsor and one that Ballmer had invested $50 million in after Leonard signed an extension in August 2021 \u2014 that required him to do nothing in terms of promotion or endorsements.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Joe Sanberg, an Aspiration co-founder, pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud for defrauding investors and lenders of more than $248 million, the Justice Department announced in August.<\/p>\n

The Boston Sports Journal reported<\/a> last week that Leonard had a second agreement with Aspiration, which was described as a \u201cside deal\u201d to get an extra $20 million in company stock from Sandberg\u2019s personal holdings.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The NBA hired the law firm<\/a> of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz to conduct an investigation into the allegations surrounding Leonard and the Clippers.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kawhi Leonard\u2019s representation asked for a number of things \u2014 including a stake in an NHL team \u2014…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":186965,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5106],"tags":[5,17992,571,20,5172,555,4,43,66,31,17109,5171],"class_list":{"0":"post-186964","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-toronto-maple-leafs","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-kawhi-leonard","10":"tag-los-angeles-clippers","11":"tag-maple-leafs","12":"tag-mapleleafs","13":"tag-nba","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-toronto","17":"tag-toronto-maple-leafs","18":"tag-toronto-raptors","19":"tag-torontomapleleafs"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115177760145779438","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186964","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=186964"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186964\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/186965"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186964"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}