Kawhi Leonard Signed a Secret $28M Deal. Steve Ballmer Funded a Fraud. We Followed the Money. | PTFO

[Sofia]

I think we can all agree this story has been blown way out of proportion, only leaked to keep the NBA in the news during the start of NFL season and the Clippers and Bally will get off relatively scot free.

The only massive hit/punishment for The Clippers is if the NBA force Ballimer to sell the team (which they won't)

[Lakers In 5]

Pablo: *drops evidence*
Cuban: "You're wrong"
Pablo: *drops an even more damning piece of evidence*
Cuban: "Will you NOW admit that you were wrong?"

The Cuban thing is so weird to me that he has me writing up conspiracy theories. He cannot possibly be this stupid, right? Everything he says leads Pablo to more evidence. His antics make me feel like Cuban is some sort of double agent who is trying to play dumb in order to point Pablo in the right direction. 'No Pablo, that is not what happened. But if you look over here *points at evidence* you might find something.'

[doogie_hauser]

Pablo: *drops evidence*
Cuban: "You're wrong"
Pablo: *drops an even more damning piece of evidence*
Cuban: "Will you NOW admit that you were wrong?"

The Cuban thing is so weird to me that he has me writing up conspiracy theories. He cannot possibly be this stupid, right? Everything he says leads Pablo to more evidence. His antics make me feel like Cuban is some sort of double agent who is trying to play dumb in order to point Pablo in the right direction. 'No Pablo, that is not what happened. But if you look over here *points at evidence* you might find something.'

Cuban is a very interesting and surprisingly insightful political animal if you read/follow his account on Bluesky.

Been unafraid to be critical of Trump and many of his business and ethical policies.

I actually now really like and respect the Cube tbh

[inonba]

Cuban is a snake.

Outside of the carbon credits, I think I've been pretty accurate in my analysis thus far. Now that I've had some time to digest the info released today, I think I figured out why Ballmer was so brazen to just go and buy some carbon credits.....Ballmer is the head of the audit committee. What I previously thought to be way too obvious is making sense now.

The second aspect that stood out to me is Sandburg's deposition where he pleaded the 5th. I think many who heard that answer assumed both were engaged in some illegal activity. Then I remembered a question I asked several pages ago: Wouldn't it be easier if Aspiration just extort Ballmer for the money. Now, I think that's precisely what happened.

[TheAlchemist]

David stern would have dropped the hammer already. He would have handed out fines and taken away draft capital to get this behind them. Silver is a big vagine for letting this drag.

Stern would’ve came out with a cigar in his mouth wielding two AK-47s.

He wouldn’t let the players wear street clothes let alone this lol.

That being said, silvers in a tough position. Might tank the worth of the league doing something against Balmer. At the same time , this is clear as day as Salar cap evasion.

[BruttoNostra]

So is the thinking now that the first $50M was an actual investment, and subsequent carbon credit purchases were to pay Kawhi?

Someone else mentioned that they think the company was a Ponzi scheme but I’m not really sure about that. I think they’re were trying to build a real company. A lot of tech companies lose money for years but at least have decent revenue to justify continued investment. They just had a crazy burn rate and took money meant for Kawhi and used it for something else. One thing I do want to mention that I think Pablo got wrong is he was asking why the clippers needed carbon credits when the arena wasn’t build but construction creates a lot of carbon emissions. I’m pretty sure making concrete is in the top 10 for release carbon into the atmosphere.

They were a Ponzi scheme in the sense that they were using new investor money to fund old commitments. When there were no new investors coming in, Ballmer ended up being the lasts several layers to ensure Kawhi got paid.

Dennis Wong's payment looked incriminating because of the investment timing in close proximity to Kawhi's payout, the carbon credits look way worse. 32M on the same day Kawhi signed the 28M contract, another 21M a half month before Kawhi was due his first payment.

This pretty much explains why Kawhi's payments were the company's highest priority as Ballmer was effectively bankrolling the company as long as Kawhi got paid.

Not only that.
I think there were reports from inside the company that they barely plant any threes at all. Too lazy to look for it now, but I think it was one of the first anonymous reports in the beginning of the saga.
And yea, there is plenty of scam in Venture Capital world, so someone like Ballmer is one of:
1. definitely knew it's a scam, and still put there significant amounts of money
2. didn't initiate any normal due diligence (scammers of the world, target him please)
3. Simply stupid

Let's agree 2 isn't a real option, especially since not only his personal money was there, but the team itself bought there carbon credits, so team pros should have done their job.
So it's either 1 or 3. I don't believe in 3 - I don't think he is a genius, and his tenure at Microsoft isn't remarkable, but there is a difference between stubborn/overconfident and stupid. He isn't stupid.

[BruttoNostra]

Clippers release a statement:

“Steve 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,” the Clippers said in a Thursday, Sept. 18 statement responding to the carbon offset purchases.

The team went on to say that its “development agreements for the arena included mandates to buy carbon credits,” but that the Clippers “went far beyond those requirements” and sought to buy carbon offsets from Aspiration.

“Some of those commitments were built into the sponsorship deal with Aspiration — totally separate of the investment in the company — and we made payments to Aspiration until the company was unable to fulfill their responsibilities,” the statement continues.

“This 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.”

I'm waiting for the next PR release that says as a continued effort, after the Aspiration deal ended, Steve immediately partnered with another company and bought the same number of carbon credits from them and conveniently forgot to announce the new deal.

PR people are good at spinning, but at this point, they should really keep their mouths shut and stop digging themselves into a bigger hole.

Great point! It's like a junior LLM model wrote that PR. Very newbie mistake.

I mean...

This effort reflects Steve wanting to set a positive example and raise awareness of the growing and important role of voluntary carbon markets.

Mr Ballmer, can we see that massive PR campaign about buying carbon credits from Aspiration? Because I see zero such evidence, beyond some dry PR releases (there is a huge difference between PR campaign and official PR releases)

[biebstothelotto]

Steve Balmer: I care about the environment

Also Steve Balmer:

https://celebrityprivatejettracker.com/steve-ballmer-n709ds/#gref

https://skyindustrynews.com/stories/670921254-steve-ballmer-s-78-million-gulfstream-g650er-jet-exemplifies-private-luxury-travel

[Pattycakes]

Steve Balmer: I care about the environment

Also Steve Balmer:

https://celebrityprivatejettracker.com/steve-ballmer-n709ds/#gref

https://skyindustrynews.com/stories/670921254-steve-ballmer-s-78-million-gulfstream-g650er-jet-exemplifies-private-luxury-travel

Anyone naive enough to sympathize for a billionaire doesn’t get it

[inonba]

Someone else mentioned that they think the company was a Ponzi scheme but I’m not really sure about that. I think they’re were trying to build a real company. A lot of tech companies lose money for years but at least have decent revenue to justify continued investment. They just had a crazy burn rate and took money meant for Kawhi and used it for something else. One thing I do want to mention that I think Pablo got wrong is he was asking why the clippers needed carbon credits when the arena wasn’t build but construction creates a lot of carbon emissions. I’m pretty sure making concrete is in the top 10 for release carbon into the atmosphere.

They were a Ponzi scheme in the sense that they were using new investor money to fund old commitments. When there were no new investors coming in, Ballmer ended up being the lasts several layers to ensure Kawhi got paid.

Dennis Wong's payment looked incriminating because of the investment timing in close proximity to Kawhi's payout, the carbon credits look way worse. 32M on the same day Kawhi signed the 28M contract, another 21M a half month before Kawhi was due his first payment.

This pretty much explains why Kawhi's payments were the company's highest priority as Ballmer was effectively bankrolling the company as long as Kawhi got paid.

Not only that.
I think there were reports from inside the company that they barely plant any threes at all. Too lazy to look for it now, but I think it was one of the first anonymous reports in the beginning of the saga.
And yea, there is plenty of scam in Venture Capital world, so someone like Ballmer is one of:
1. definitely knew it's a scam, and still put there significant amounts of money
2. didn't initiate any normal due diligence (scammers of the world, target him please)
3. Simply stupid

Let's agree 2 isn't a real option, especially since not only his personal money was there, but the team itself bought there carbon credits, so team pros should have done their job.
So it's either 1 or 3. I don't believe in 3 - I don't think he is a genius, and his tenure at Microsoft isn't remarkable, but there is a difference between stubborn/overconfident and stupid. He isn't stupid.

Aspiration for the practical sense didn't plant any trees themselves. They partnered with various non profits to do the actual tree planting. How much money did they actually spend is unknown, but seeing the financial difficulties they were in, the number was probably close to the number of trees Aspiration planted themselves.

The question really stems from how much does Steve Ballmer actually care about the environment ? That was one of the key points the Clippers PR department was trying to drive home. How true is it?

1. His deal with Aspiration requires a significant amount of money, if not all the money collected from ticket sales be returned to Clippers organization. To me, that sounded like caring about the appearance of being able to call your organization carbon neutral, rather than doing anything tangible.
2. Post fraud, they have yet to announce another partnership with another company. Going forward, are they going to give the money from ticket sales to the non profits that should have done the tree planting, just pocket the money, or just scrap the entire thing and pretend nothing had happened remains to be seen. I should point out this aspect most likely is still under investigation.

Don't rule out #2 as initially, there is a chance he didn't do much due diligence as they were getting money from Aspiration and was using fan money to pay them.

[BruttoNostra]

They were a Ponzi scheme in the sense that they were using new investor money to fund old commitments. When there were no new investors coming in, Ballmer ended up being the lasts several layers to ensure Kawhi got paid.

Dennis Wong's payment looked incriminating because of the investment timing in close proximity to Kawhi's payout, the carbon credits look way worse. 32M on the same day Kawhi signed the 28M contract, another 21M a half month before Kawhi was due his first payment.

This pretty much explains why Kawhi's payments were the company's highest priority as Ballmer was effectively bankrolling the company as long as Kawhi got paid.

Not only that.
I think there were reports from inside the company that they barely plant any threes at all. Too lazy to look for it now, but I think it was one of the first anonymous reports in the beginning of the saga.
And yea, there is plenty of scam in Venture Capital world, so someone like Ballmer is one of:
1. definitely knew it's a scam, and still put there significant amounts of money
2. didn't initiate any normal due diligence (scammers of the world, target him please)
3. Simply stupid

Let's agree 2 isn't a real option, especially since not only his personal money was there, but the team itself bought there carbon credits, so team pros should have done their job.
So it's either 1 or 3. I don't believe in 3 - I don't think he is a genius, and his tenure at Microsoft isn't remarkable, but there is a difference between stubborn/overconfident and stupid. He isn't stupid.

Aspiration for the practical sense didn't plant any trees themselves. They partnered with various non profits to do the actual tree planting. How much money did they actually spend is unknown, but seeing the financial difficulties they were in, the number was probably close to the number of trees Aspiration planted themselves.

The question really stems from how much does Steve Ballmer actually care about the environment ? That was one of the key points the Clippers PR department was trying to drive home. How true is it?

1. His deal with Aspiration requires a significant amount of money, if not all the money collected from ticket sales be returned to Clippers organization. To me, that sounded like caring about the appearance of being able to call your organization carbon neutral, rather than doing anything tangible.
2. Post fraud, they have yet to announce another partnership with another company. Going forward, are they going to give the money from ticket sales to the non profits that should have done the tree planting, just pocket the money, or just scrap the entire thing and pretend nothing had happened remains to be seen. I should point out this aspect most likely is still under investigation.

Don't rule out #2 as initially, there is a chance he didn't do much due diligence as they were getting money from Aspiration and was using fan money to pay them.

Yes, of course they "outsource" that part.
But just like with, say AirBNB - if I was about to invest in them in their early stages, I know they don't own any real estate by themselves, but I would be interested in how many real owners they onboarded.
Same here - there was a report about next to zero activity in tree planning, direct or indirect. Any reasonable investor (and not ponzi scheme lover or cap circumvention fraudster) would take a look at that.

[SNPA]

Besides the basketball cheating part, there’s another element to this that pisses me (and I believe many others) off.

You have the sixth richest man in the world come out publicly and just full-on gaslight us and expects us to swallow his ****. The sheer brazenness and lack of respect for the intelligence of others is astonishing. He thinks because he is rich he can get away with it, it’s this arrogance that makes the billionaire class so unlikable. Cuban’s but he is to smart bit doesn’t help either. That’s just another billionaire who has convinced himself all billionaires are geniuses. **** these guys.

[Hello Brooklyn]

Wonder how much of a revolt there would be from other teams and fans if Silver tried to sweep it under a rug.

If there aren't serious penalties, what's to keep other teams from setting up dummy corporations or funnel money through parties willing to be money launderers (for a commission of course) to route money to NBA stars?

If they set a precedent, basically give light or no punishment for this kind of cap circumvention, then in a few years, EVERY team can get way under the cap as you see all these "discount" contracts signed by franchise players who should be getting the max or super max.

Only everyone knows they're getting side money in addition to their official NBA team contract.

Most fans are going to not care about this. I doubt most owners will care.

A lot of teams do stuff like this and just don't get caught. Its been alleged that Joe Tsai gave KD/Kyrie a ton of perks too.

Balmer didn't set up a dummy corporation. He invested in a business that also gave an endorsement to Kawhi. This type of stuff happens all the time.

The only difference is that Kawhi was stupid enough to not actually do anything to earn the endorsement. If he even did one event or made one Tweet there would be really no case against what he did.

Circumvention requires actual proof. And there is still no proof at all that Balmer knew about it.

I imagine that the league may pass reforms on the types of player endorsements players can take. But players union would probably be strongly opposed to it.

Bottom line: It won't set a precedent because this has always been happening. Teams will just be more careful.

Silver mentioned in one of his interviews that while the NBA doesn't have all encompassing rules, they have some guidelines for endorsements, such as percentage of company owned. He essentially said that since there's a lot of big money in the situations now, that the NBA will have to look into adjusting it's rules in relation to this stuff.

So that's one area we will likely see some sort of changes made.

Disagree that owners don't care, they aren't all Ballmer rich.

NBA can look at adjusting its rule. But good look on getting the PA to agree to scrutinizing player endorsements.

Silver has little power in making actual changes to the rules.

[Invictus88]

The correct thing to do now, would be to let the investigation play out for a few more weeks gathering anything and everything they can and talk to as many people as they can including Leonard, Uncle Dennis, clippers from office people and anyone from Aspiration willing to talk.

If they can't find much more than what's already been reported, essentially give the Clippers a max fine (like $7.5 million I think) and hit them for a few 2nd round picks essentially stating that the Clippers circumvented the cap due to Ballmer having ownership in Aspiration while Aspiration also sponsored Leonard to an unreasonably high contract... even if Ballmer claims to not have knowledge.

NBA can make a statement about how moving forward they will have a more detailed policy on cap circumvention and they that any business that 1% or more of is owned by an NBA owner is not allowed to sponsor athletes.... At the same time, moving forward, NBA players need to make the league aware of any and all sponsorship deals they have in excess of $1 million per year from any company anywhere.

This pretty much equates to a slap on the wrist with a promise to do better in the future, and it lets Ballmer continue to claim he didn't realize he was doing anything that violated the CBA because it wasn't expressly laid out in the cap circumvention rules, but that he understands and accepts the punishment from the league and he'll be more careful moving forward, etc.

Letting this drag out until February would be awful IMO the league really needs to get some punishment out now and really try to minimize it in a way that they aren't painting Ballmer as a cheater as much as they are saying that even though he was unaware he was doing so, by having ownership in Aspiration that deal was deemed to be circumvention.

I’m unsure a 2-week expedited investigation leading to a slap on the wrist is the “correct” thing to here, but ok.

The correct thing from the league's standpoint.... having this drag on all season and constantly being asked about seems like a real L for the league. Doing nothing, just knowing the evidence we have seems like a real L for the league as well. Spend the next few weeks to a month to really try an dive in and make sure there's no smoking gun and if there isn't you try to hold Ballmer accountable in as nice and least damaging way as possible so #1 He doesn't come back at the league and #2 you don't destroy the working relationship.

The worst thing would to do IMO is let this drag on all season and then say we didn't find anything there's no punishment.

Ballmer's ownership of the Intuit Dome and everything else he has sunk into in the league makes it incredibly unlikely they go hard on him unless there's an actual paper trail detailing how in order to get Ballmer's money Aspiration had to secretly pay Leonard a huge no show endorsement deal. That's super unlikely to appear anywhere.

No. The worst thing to do is make the penalty meaningless; giving license to everyone else to massively defraud the cba.

After everything that has been revealed you are still going to believe that Ballmer didn't know? News flash: Ballmer is the problem here. What he and the Clippers did IS the problem.

Ballmer's actions (if unchecked) basically nullify any and all controls of spending by owners. There. Is. Literally. Nothing. Worse. Than. That. if you are trying to maintain profitability.

You don't need a document signed with Steve Ballmer's bloody fingerprints on it. The evidence revealed so far is more than sufficient. If you don't think so then you are living in a river in Egypt.

[Hello Brooklyn]

Wonder how much of a revolt there would be from other teams and fans if Silver tried to sweep it under a rug.

If there aren't serious penalties, what's to keep other teams from setting up dummy corporations or funnel money through parties willing to be money launderers (for a commission of course) to route money to NBA stars?

If they set a precedent, basically give light or no punishment for this kind of cap circumvention, then in a few years, EVERY team can get way under the cap as you see all these "discount" contracts signed by franchise players who should be getting the max or super max.

Only everyone knows they're getting side money in addition to their official NBA team contract.

Most fans are going to not care about this. I doubt most owners will care.

A lot of teams do stuff like this and just don't get caught. Its been alleged that Joe Tsai gave KD/Kyrie a ton of perks too.

Balmer didn't set up a dummy corporation. He invested in a business that also gave an endorsement to Kawhi. This type of stuff happens all the time.

The only difference is that Kawhi was stupid enough to not actually do anything to earn the endorsement. If he even did one event or made one Tweet there would be really no case against what he did.

Circumvention requires actual proof. And there is still no proof at all that Balmer knew about it.

I imagine that the league may pass reforms on the types of player endorsements players can take. But players union would probably be strongly opposed to it.

Bottom line: It won't set a precedent because this has always been happening. Teams will just be more careful.

Interesting.

So what would you say about the close proximity of the payments from the Clipps or from part-owners of the Clipps to Aspiration, and the payments from Aspiration to Mr. Leonard?

Seem pretty damning to me.

It looks bad but its purely circumstantial.

The most I can see is a fine to the Clippers for negligence. But you need proof that Balmer was involved and right now there is nothing.

[Hello Brooklyn]

Wonder how much of a revolt there would be from other teams and fans if Silver tried to sweep it under a rug.

If there aren't serious penalties, what's to keep other teams from setting up dummy corporations or funnel money through parties willing to be money launderers (for a commission of course) to route money to NBA stars?

If they set a precedent, basically give light or no punishment for this kind of cap circumvention, then in a few years, EVERY team can get way under the cap as you see all these "discount" contracts signed by franchise players who should be getting the max or super max.

Only everyone knows they're getting side money in addition to their official NBA team contract.

Most fans are going to not care about this. I doubt most owners will care.

A lot of teams do stuff like this and just don't get caught. Its been alleged that Joe Tsai gave KD/Kyrie a ton of perks too.

Balmer didn't set up a dummy corporation. He invested in a business that also gave an endorsement to Kawhi. This type of stuff happens all the time.

The only difference is that Kawhi was stupid enough to not actually do anything to earn the endorsement. If he even did one event or made one Tweet there would be really no case against what he did.

Circumvention requires actual proof. And there is still no proof at all that Balmer knew about it.

I imagine that the league may pass reforms on the types of player endorsements players can take. But players union would probably be strongly opposed to it.

Bottom line: It won't set a precedent because this has always been happening. Teams will just be more careful.

People keep saying this without being able to cite examples of this always happening. The ONLY example is the report that the Nets paid for apartments for Kyrie and Durants girlfriends, and that's a miniscule amount of money compared to this. If I had to make an educated guess, there are less than 5 owners that are okay with this, and in a league with 30 teams, that's going to be a problem for Silver if he attempts slap wrists and walk away.

The league need not pass reforms as there are existing CBA rules that were broken.

Bill Simmons was on the record on his pod saying this happens all the time. Joe House even directly alluded to KD/Kyrie getting interest in foreign companies.

Of course it hasn't been reported because teams try to keep it private.

[snaquille oatmeal]

Legit question: if Silver gets his cojones in order and the punishment comes to something like, KL contract is voided and he gets suspended from the league for the remainder of his contract (till the end of 2026 season I believe) the Clippers are forced to keep his salary count in their cap till the end of 2026 season. Would the NBA Players association have a problem with that because it would be interfering with other players chances at getting signed with KL’s cap money for the Clippers or is it just non of the NBAPA business?

[Hello Brooklyn]

Most fans are going to not care about this. I doubt most owners will care.

A lot of teams do stuff like this and just don't get caught. Its been alleged that Joe Tsai gave KD/Kyrie a ton of perks too.

Balmer didn't set up a dummy corporation. He invested in a business that also gave an endorsement to Kawhi. This type of stuff happens all the time.

The only difference is that Kawhi was stupid enough to not actually do anything to earn the endorsement. If he even did one event or made one Tweet there would be really no case against what he did.

Circumvention requires actual proof. And there is still no proof at all that Balmer knew about it.

I imagine that the league may pass reforms on the types of player endorsements players can take. But players union would probably be strongly opposed to it.

Bottom line: It won't set a precedent because this has always been happening. Teams will just be more careful.

Good to know that after 89 pages of content, there's still someone looking for that signed confession.

Implication for Salary Cap Circumvention:
Disproportionate size of Kawhi's contract
No deliverables
Timing with Contract Events
Prioritized disbursement
Timing of Dennis Wong investment

I haven't encountered anyone even come close to providing a reasonable explanation for the above list without implicating a larger crime, not to mention the mountain of evidence surrounding it.

If anyone wants to try, be my guest, but in both criminal and civil investigations, the law often infers intent from behavior and timing, especially when: “No other plausible explanation fits the facts.”

For example, in regards to the Dennis Wong investment: If the league were to try to prove cap circumvention or similar wrongdoing, the alignment (due payment date → missed payment → owner infusion → payment made) is exactly the sort of “temporal correlation + financial flow” evidence they’d want. It doesn’t prove definitively that the infusion was solely for that payment, or that intent to circumvent was admitted, but it's strong circumstantial evidence that it's exactly what happened.

A signed confession? How about any proof at all that Balmer knew or directed any of the money going to Kawhi?

Do you not understand how evidence works?

The law doesn't "infer" things without proof. Please don't tell me how it works or you will look foolish

Everything you have mentioned is purely circumstantial. Its not on Balmer to "prove" why Aspiration did what it did. Its on the league to prove that Balmer was in on it. And so far they have nothing.

Don't take my word for it. Listen to legal expert Michael McCann on the Zach Lowe podcast who came to the same conclusion.

There is simply no way that the NBA is going to give Balmer a serious punishment for something they can't prove he was involved in at all. It won't happen.

The Joe Smith, Donald Sterling and Robert Sarver situations all required direct evidence.

[The Master]

It looks bad but its purely circumstantial.

The most I can see is a fine to the Clippers for negligence. But you need proof that Balmer was involved and right now there is nothing.

1. You don't need a direct evidence from CBA standpoint to punish the Clippers.
2. The only explanation of the whole situation is that they wanted, among other things, to circumvent salary cap.

If there's a plausible explanation from the Clippers of the whole situation (e.g. why Ballmer invested 10 mil $ for 23 $ per share while knowing that the company is in default and literally no one wanted to invest in them anymore) - then yeah, you can go with 'no direct evidence' defense.

Because for now, even this Ballmer's public explanation ('no idea why they paid Kawhi as much as they did' and 'they conned me') just doesn't make sense anymore. 'They conned him' - and he invested for twice as much as he did in 2021 per share, while it was officially disclosed in the papers that this company is in an awful situation? He can't (or shouldn't be able to) play 'I had no idea' card anymore.

Also, widespread belief inside the company that it happened due to salary cap ramifications is quite an evidence, I would say.

To give the Clippers ANY benefit of the doubt - someone has to provide ANY alternative and realistic explanation of what happened, as circumstantial evidence is enough to punish them.

[TheAlchemist]

The ESPN show yesterday taking credit from Torres was BS. But one thing I started hearing is the whole "Kawhi and Clippers will split" angle.

Looks like LAC leaking info and blaming Kawhi and Uncle Dennis. Most likely the Kawhi contract will be voided and the huge amount of evidence pushes silver to make a decision.

If he does get voided, it's interesting to hear what Kawhi would do in this situation. Does he sign a max or as close to the max possible, with a team? Or stays in California ? Sac/GSW/Lakers?

As a Raptors fan I would love it if he came back here lol. But that's far gone now that Masai is gone. Could he return to the Spurs?