{"id":166754,"date":"2025-09-19T02:57:06","date_gmt":"2025-09-19T02:57:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/166754\/"},"modified":"2025-09-19T02:57:06","modified_gmt":"2025-09-19T02:57:06","slug":"latest-on-clippers-steve-ballmer-kawhi-leonard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/166754\/","title":{"rendered":"Latest On Clippers, Steve Ballmer, Kawhi Leonard"},"content":{"rendered":"

After Mavericks minority stakeholder Mark Cuban suggested in a Twitter post<\/a> that journalist and podcaster Pablo Torre should dig into the carbon credits that the Clippers bought from the now-bankrupt \u201cgreen bank\u201d company Aspiration, Torre did just that in the latest edition of his Pablo Torre Finds Out podcast (YouTube link<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Cuban had speculated that those carbon credits could be an easier and safer way for the team to circumvent the cap to pay Leonard, as opposed to simply investing in the company. Since the margin was so high on those credits, those purchases could provide Aspiration with a quick influx of cash that created the appearance of real revenue.<\/p>\n

Torre\u2019s findings point to that being a possibility, as the Clippers purchased roughly $21MM in carbon credits from Aspiration in June 2022, shortly before the first payment to Kawhi Leonard<\/a> for his alleged \u201cno-show\u201d deal was due (Twitter video link<\/a>). The Clippers had purchased another $35MM in carbon credits in April 2022, right around the time Leonard signed that endorsement agreement that didn\u2019t actually require him to do any endorsement work.<\/p>\n

Responding to Torre\u2019s latest report, the Clippers said in a statement those carbon credit purchases were part of owner Steve Ballmer\u2018s effort to ensure Intuit Dome would be as environmentally friendly an arena as possible.<\/p>\n

\u201cSteve and his family are focused on sustainability, which is why Intuit Dome was designed to be a carbon neutral building from its inception and to achieve LEED Zero status over time,\u201d the Clippers said. \u201cOur development agreements for the arena included mandates to buy carbon credits, but after studying the issue of neutrality, we went far beyond those requirements, exploring ways to address emissions from our fans and contracting with Aspiration to directly purchase carbon offsets, as well as broker the acquisition of additional offsets.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of those commitments were built into the sponsorship deal with Aspiration \u2014 totally separate of the investment in the company \u2014 and we made payments to Aspiration until the company was unable to fulfill their responsibilities.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis effort reflects Steve wanting to set a positive example and raise awareness of the growing and important role of voluntary carbon markets. Unfortunately, he was duped on the investment and on some parts of this agreement, as were many other investors and employees.\u201d<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s more on the ongoing Clippers\/Leonard story:<\/p>\n

Within his latest podcast, Torre provided some additional details on Ballmer\u2019s $10MM investment<\/a> in Aspiration in March 2023, which occurred shortly before the government began investigating the company. According to Torre, Ballmer paid $23 per share at that point, which was more than double\u00a0the share price he paid<\/a> when he invested $50MM in 2021. John Karalis of Boston Sports Journal (Twitter<\/a> links<\/a>) wonders if that inflated share price was a way for Ballmer to avoid assuming more than a 5% stake in Aspiration, which is prohibited by NBA rules for any company that employs a player as an endorser.
\nPeople around the league don\u2019t expect the investigation into Ballmer, the Clippers, and Leonard to conclude until sometime after the All-Star game, which will take place at Intuit Dome, Jake Fischer said in a Bleacher Report live stream this week (YouTube link<\/a>). That probe is being conducted by the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, which has led multiple independent investigations for the NBA, including the 2014 inquiry into Donald Sterling that resulted in the former Clippers owner selling the team to Ballmer.
\nIn case you missed it, John Hollinger of The Athletic took a closer look at earlier this week<\/a> at the punishments that the Clippers and Leonard could face as a result of the investigation and explained why he doesn\u2019t expect the NBA to void the forward\u2019s contract.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After Mavericks minority stakeholder Mark Cuban suggested in a Twitter post that journalist and podcaster Pablo Torre should…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166755,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[11653,99,11652],"class_list":{"0":"post-166754","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-kawhi-leonard","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-steve-ballmer"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}