Kawhi Leonard: Los Angeles Clippers fined $30m and stripped of five first-round picks after Leonard salary cap scandal | NBA News
The Los Angeles Clippers were fined $30m and star player Kawhi Leonard was hit with a $700,000 penalty by the NBA on Wednesday for violating salary cap circumvention rules.
The league came down hard on the organisation after a nearly year-long investigation.
Owner Steve Ballmer has been suspended for one year, president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank has been suspended without pay for six months and president of business operations Gillian Zucker was suspended for one year, all for their involvement.
The Clippers were also stripped of five first-round draft picks.
The Clippers had said multiple times that they had done nothing wrong and expected to be exonerated.
“I accept full responsibility for lapses in judgment by people within my inner circle and regret the distraction this situation has caused the fans and my family,” Leonard said in a statement issued through his new agent, Harrison Gaines.
The NBA said Leonard, through his former business manager and uncle Dennis Robertson, “violated the circumvention rules by pressuring the Clippers to assist him in obtaining off-court income opportunities, successfully obtaining those opportunities, and failing to reimburse payments by the Clippers for personal expenses.”
“I entered into my contract with the Clippers as well as the agreements in question in good faith, fully committed to fulfilling my obligations and with no knowledge of any intent on anyone’s part to circumvent the salary cap,” Leonard said in his statement.
The league said Ballmer was suspended for “knowingly seeking to help Mr. Leonard obtain off-court income opportunities,” among other issues.
An investigation conducted by New York law firm Wachtell Lipton said the Clippers broke NBA rules by initiating off-court income opportunities between Leonard and four companies doing business with the team, as well as facilitating endorsement agreements between Leonard and the companies.
It added that the Clippers “induced the companies to enter into these agreements by offering them business from the team”, as well as paying personal expenses on behalf of Leonard and “failing to report improper solicitations for off-court income opportunities” made on Leonard’s behalf through his then-business manager Dennis Robertson.
NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said: “The NBA’s collectively bargained system for determining player compensation is a fundamental component of the basketball competition that the league oversees for the benefit of the teams and players and ultimately the fans. I am deeply disappointed by the flagrant violations of our rules and by the Clippers’ institutional and leadership failures that led to this misconduct. The severity of the penalties reflects the seriousness of the violations.”
