2025 NBA Offseason News

[Split T]

Seems most of it happened before the days of the 2nd apron, but definitely impacted luxury tax payments I’m sure. Going to be interesting to see what the penalty is.

[O_Gardino]

Did it impact tax payments, or just let them give Leonard more money that the max? If he was maxed out, then following the rules doesn't mean more tax money. It means Kawhi gets less money and maybe chooses another team that was "only" offering the max.

[Mori Chu]

I don't mean to be cynical or conspiratorial, but I bet a lot of stuff vaguely like this happens in the NBA and in sports. They can "only" pay the player $50m, but they also hook him up with a local car dealership that offers him a $5m endorsement, and they know a guy who will hire the player's cousins, and they know another guy who has some free cars and furniture, etc. etc. etc. I think it's pretty telling that pretty much the instant the NCAA allowed players to basically get paid, suddenly there was this huge infrastructure in place of hooking players up with these kinds of perks. Funny how they managed to get all that set up within minutes of the rules changes.

None of the above is meant to condone or excuse the Kawhi scandal, though. If they really did that, they should be punished. Probably cap penalties, draft pick removals, forced no-trade clauses in Beal's new LAC contract, horrible punishments of that nature.

[ShelC]

The old "it's only cheating if you get caught". And of course, there are people now going after Torre for reporting wrongdoing because we don't like journalists exposing things. If you're a Clippers fan, this is just a hit piece and "everyone else does it".

Either have rules and enforce them or don't. The Knicks hired Rick Brunson before they signed Jalen. They signed Chris Smith to a contract as a favor to JR when he re-signed with them. Giannis' brother has been on the Bucks' roster how many years? There are gray areas for sure, but setting up or working with a 3rd party to funnel money to a player under the table is a clear violation of cap rules.

[wpmiller42]

Cam Thomas is signing a one-year qualifying offer, so he'll be an unrestricted free agent next year.

I wonder what this does to move the Kuminga situation along? Does he decide to bet on himself too? Or does the threat of him signing the qualifying offer push the Warriors to get something done? I personally think he would be a good get for us, provided we don't give up any draft picks and only the bare minimum to make salaries work.

[O_Gardino]

I mean, it's fine if it's a real company and Kawhi is doing real adds for them. I really don't mind if teams help players find advertising opportunities, or if teams help family members find work. As long as it's real work, who cares?

The allegation that this is a shell company that doesn't exist except to move money from owners to players is the wild part. Why not just give Kahwi an advertising deal with Microsoft? Show the man reviewing film on a Surface Pro, then relaxing at home with an XBox. I don't really understand finance at that level, but I would guess that Ballmer can't just give Microsoft $50 million or whatever without tax ramifications or an impact on Microsoft stock or something. Maybe it's not really NBA rules but tax rules that are allegedly being dodged? I really don't know.

[ShelC]

Cam Thomas is signing a one-year qualifying offer, so he'll be an unrestricted free agent next year.

I wonder what this does to move the Kuminga situation along? Does he decide to bet on himself too? Or does the threat of him signing the qualifying offer push the Warriors to get something done? I personally think he would be a good get for us, provided we don't give up any draft picks and only the bare minimum to make salaries work.

The thing about hitting UFA is that there have to be teams out there with cap space AND willing to spend it on someone like Thomas or Kuminga. It's why we had that leverage with DA. He wasn't getting more from other teams than we could offer. So maybe there are teams that will give Thomas and Kuminga $30m/year but if not, they're almost stuck in the same spot taking what they can get.

[Mori Chu]

I mean, it's fine if it's a real company and Kawhi is doing real adds for them. I really don't mind if teams help players find advertising opportunities, or if teams help family members find work. As long as it's real work, who cares?

The allegation that this is a shell company that doesn't exist except to move money from owners to players is the wild part. Why not just give Kahwi an advertising deal with Microsoft? Show the man reviewing film on a Surface Pro, then relaxing at home with an XBox. I don't really understand finance at that level, but I would guess that Ballmer can't just give Microsoft $50 million or whatever without tax ramifications or an impact on Microsoft stock or something. Maybe it's not really NBA rules but tax rules that are allegedly being dodged? I really don't know.

But (if true) it's pretty transparently a workaround for cap restrictions. If we say "the max salary is $50m" and the team signs him for $50m, but then they directly set up a company that also signs a deal to pay the guy another $50m, it's blatantly the case that they are just agreeing to pay him $100m and circumventing cap rules. The folks who set up the NBA rules and CBA have been trying to protect against that sort of meddling, especially by the league's richest owners (Ballmer) in the NBA's biggest markets (LA). They don't want the "haves" to just outspend the "have-nots" and hoard talent in defiance of the rules.

[O_Gardino]

I mean, it's fine if it's a real company and Kawhi is doing real adds for them. I really don't mind if teams help players find advertising opportunities, or if teams help family members find work. As long as it's real work, who cares?

The allegation that this is a shell company that doesn't exist except to move money from owners to players is the wild part. Why not just give Kahwi an advertising deal with Microsoft? Show the man reviewing film on a Surface Pro, then relaxing at home with an XBox. I don't really understand finance at that level, but I would guess that Ballmer can't just give Microsoft $50 million or whatever without tax ramifications or an impact on Microsoft stock or something. Maybe it's not really NBA rules but tax rules that are allegedly being dodged? I really don't know.

But (if true) it's pretty transparently a workaround for cap restrictions. If we say "the max salary is $50m" and the team signs him for $50m, but then they directly set up a company that also signs a deal to pay the guy another $50m, it's blatantly the case that they are just agreeing to pay him $100m and circumventing cap rules. The folks who set up the NBA rules and CBA have been trying to protect against that sort of meddling, especially by the league's richest owners (Ballmer) in the NBA's biggest markets (LA). They don't want the "haves" to just outspend the "have-nots" and hoard talent in defiance of the rules.

I agree that the NBA doesn't want that. My curiosity is about why it would make sense for Ballmer to (allegedly) set up a shell company when there are legitimate companies that could do the same thing.

[Superbone]

The Clippers wave their hand and tell us this is not the droid we're looking for:

[ShelC]

Did it impact tax payments, or just let them give Leonard more money that the max? If he was maxed out, then following the rules doesn't mean more tax money. It means Kawhi gets less money and maybe chooses another team that was "only" offering the max.

[TOO]

How much less than the max did Leonard take exactly?

[Split T]

He didn’t take less while they were a tax paying team:

[Split T]

Last summer the deal he signed was for less than the max, but LAC was out of the tax by then

[O_Gardino]

Would be funny if the NBA voided Kawhi's contract, left the $ amount on the Clippers salary cap calculations (even though they aren't paying), and didn't let Kawhi resign with either LA team.

[Mori Chu]

It's not just about whether Kawhi took a "discount" of less than the max because of this money he was being given under the table. The point is that they (allegedly) basically paid him way more than the max in violation of cap rules. That has all kind of add-on effects to it. Maybe it stopped Kawhi from leaving the Clippers and going to another team, or signing a longer deal, or expressing discontent with the team. It gave the Clips an unfair advantage vs other teams in any negotiation with Kawhi.

Admittedly, it'd be even worse if it ALSO caused Kawhi to take a non-max deal with the knowledge that his shady "endorsement" would put him over the max. But even without that aspect it's still a big problem.

I said in another post that this is probably common and other teams probably do this. But based on the reaction to this, I am starting to think that no, this is not really a common practice. Maybe on a much smaller scale, teams help their players out, get them connections to local endorsements, etc. But not like this; not just directly funneling money to fake companies created exclusively to line their players' pockets.

I think the Clippers are going to be slapped with a big punishment for this. Probably losing multiple draft picks and paying a hefty fine. The reason is because there's a precedent (situations like the Joe Smith fiasco in Minny) and because it actively hurts the other teams and owners (so they'll howl about it in private league leadership meetings and vote for consequences).

[Superbone]

[pickle]

Thomas Sorber (Thunder 15th overall pick) has a torn ACL and will be out for the season.

[virtual9mm]

Thomas Sorber (Thunder 15th overall pick) has a torn ACL and will be out for the season.

Yuck. I wish him well on his recovery.

[Mori Chu]

Thomas Sorber (Thunder 15th overall pick) has a torn ACL and will be out for the season.

That's a bummer. But luckily he's in a good org that can help him rehab and give him time to get back without a lot of pressure.