Kawhi "no-show job" that paid $28M

[WWSRD]

Ballmer funding the construction of a brand new arena and spending mad money on his team is MORE important to the NBA than his issues circumventing the cap. They just are.

Ballmer is a STAR performer for the NBA and they won't compromise having him in the fold. People need to understand who's in charge here....and to a large extent, it's Ballmer.

The NBA need to hit him where it doesn't hurt......just fine him like 100million and re-distribute it between the other owners.

[PushDaRock]

there is definitely the appearance that Balmer was willing to basically desperately throw 100 million plus directly in the toilet to avoid a cba circumvention from coming to light. Is it not possible he could just pay off the other nba owners to say that there wasn't enough here to punish him after the investigation is concluded? The only real punishments that would matter to him involve him getting to play with his toy(the clippers) and the quality of his toy's on court product. I honestly think he'd be willing to pay the other owners a billion in secret "fines" for them to just say nothing to see here.

I think it's more an optics issue here. The league can't do nothing here without losing all credibility. They're going to need to show definitive proof of innocence to clear Ballmer of wrong doing here. The owners probably still think he's a net positive regardless of this situation. They're probably more pissed that he got caught than doing what he allegedly did.

[Duffman100]

there is definitely the appearance that Balmer was willing to basically desperately throw 100 million plus directly in the toilet to avoid a cba circumvention from coming to light. Is it not possible he could just pay off the other nba owners to say that there wasn't enough here to punish him after the investigation is concluded? The only real punishments that would matter to him involve him getting to play with his toy(the clippers) and the quality of his toy's on court product. I honestly think he'd be willing to pay the other owners a billion in secret "fines" for them to just say nothing to see here.

I think it's more an optics issue here. The league can't do nothing here without losing all credibility. They're going to need to show definitive proof of innocence to clear Ballmer of wrong doing here. The owners probably still think he's a net positive regardless of this situation. They're probably more pissed that he got caught than doing what he allegedly did.

Yeah I bet the overall sentiment was "There's a much better way to do this without being so obvious"

[PushDaRock]

there is definitely the appearance that Balmer was willing to basically desperately throw 100 million plus directly in the toilet to avoid a cba circumvention from coming to light. Is it not possible he could just pay off the other nba owners to say that there wasn't enough here to punish him after the investigation is concluded? The only real punishments that would matter to him involve him getting to play with his toy(the clippers) and the quality of his toy's on court product. I honestly think he'd be willing to pay the other owners a billion in secret "fines" for them to just say nothing to see here.

To play devil's advocate, I don't believe the payments for the carbon credits add anything to the CBA circumvention case. The intention for Intuit to go "net zero" was announced from the beginning.

Is it a great way to hide a funding conduit to Kawhi? Absolutely, but their existence itself doesn't mean much.

To me, the heart of the circumvention findings still rests in 2 things:
- Kawhi's endorsement contract and stock deal
- any communication involving Uncle Dennis and/or directive to pay

Why would it not add anything when you literally just said it's a better way to fund the payments to Kawhi?

Also, we are following the money trail here. If Ballmer had only invested 20m and Kawhi was getting paid 48m to do nothing. We can view the situation as being weird but cap circumvention is pretty difficult to prove here. But, we are now seeing more and more money that was thrown into Aspiration from Ballmer and the Clippers and that only increases the odds that some of it was being funneled off to Kawhi.

You can explain some of this stuff in isolation, but why would you do that? You have a mountain of growing circumstantial evidence that keeps piling up, it would make sense to use all of it to get the most informed view possible of the situation.

[PushDaRock]

there is definitely the appearance that Balmer was willing to basically desperately throw 100 million plus directly in the toilet to avoid a cba circumvention from coming to light. Is it not possible he could just pay off the other nba owners to say that there wasn't enough here to punish him after the investigation is concluded? The only real punishments that would matter to him involve him getting to play with his toy(the clippers) and the quality of his toy's on court product. I honestly think he'd be willing to pay the other owners a billion in secret "fines" for them to just say nothing to see here.

I think it's more an optics issue here. The league can't do nothing here without losing all credibility. They're going to need to show definitive proof of innocence to clear Ballmer of wrong doing here. The owners probably still think he's a net positive regardless of this situation. They're probably more pissed that he got caught than doing what he allegedly did.

Yeah I bet the overall sentiment was "There's a much better way to do this without being so obvious"

Yup, it's just bad for everyone involved in the NBA. There are no winners coming from this.

[brownbobcat]

Why would it not add anything when you literally just said it's a better way to fund the payments to Kawhi?

Because there's a legitimate cover for those expenses. Inflating costs is a far more typical way to launder money, precisely for the reason that it's harder to trace/distinguish.

Also, we are following the money trail here. If Ballmer had only invested 20m and Kawhi was getting paid 48m to do nothing. We can view the situation as being weird but cap circumvention is pretty difficult to prove here. But, we are now seeing more and more money that was thrown into Aspiration from Ballmer and the Clippers and that only increases the odds that some of it was being funneled off to Kawhi.

You can explain some of this stuff in isolation, but why would you do that? You have a mountain of growing circumstantial evidence that keeps piling up, it would make sense to use all of it to get the most informed view possible of the situation.

Remember, Pablo himself explained that two things can simultaneously be true:
1) Clippers are circumventing cap
2) Ballmer was scammed

What I'm saying is that these carbon payments specifically do not tip the scale towards #1. For me, the endorsement contract and stock options provide the bulk of the evidence for #1.

If the endorsement deal had been reasonable and had Kawhi done at least a few things or Aspiration had announced the sponsorship, there would be nothing amiss here. If I were an investigator, I'd train my eyes squarely on the 2 Dennises - that's the money they should follow.

[Tha Cynic]

Does anyone actually think the NBA didn’t know something shady was going on with Leonard and the Clippers and most likely other teams?

The Raptors and Lakers notified them of the asks Uncle Dennis had - they “investigated” and found nothing. They care more about players gambling - something that shouldn’t even be a thing with sports which they allow.

[brownbobcat]

Does anyone actually think the NBA didn’t know something shady was going on with Leonard and the Clippers and most likely other teams?

The Raptors and Lakers notified them of the asks Uncle Dennis had - they “investigated” and found nothing. They care more about players gambling - something that shouldn’t even be a thing with sports which they allow.

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it." - Upton Sinclair

A gambling scandal threatens NBA money, minor cap circumvention does not.

[CPT]

Ballmer funding the construction of a brand new arena and spending mad money on his team is MORE important to the NBA than his issues circumventing the cap. They just are.

Ballmer is a STAR performer for the NBA and they won't compromise having him in the fold. People need to understand who's in charge here....and to a large extent, it's Ballmer.

The NBA need to hit him where it doesn't hurt......just fine him like 100million and re-distribute it between the other owners.

I don’t understand this line of thinking.

STAR performer? How many people watch the NBA because of Ballmer?

If he has to sell, another billionaire would take his place and nobody would care.

If anything, having just built a new arena is leverage against him. What’s he going to do with it if he’s stripped of his team?

Keeping him on could easily cost more fans than he ever brought in.

[CPT]

I keep seeing suggestions that the other owners might not care about a little salary cap circumvention. Maybe they don’t.

They definitely care about a little luxury tax circumvention.

Ballmer is essentially taking money from the other owners’ pockets, so unless he’s putting it back in some other deal, the owners are going to want retribution.

[Zeno]

I think it's more an optics issue here. The league can't do nothing here without losing all credibility. They're going to need to show definitive proof of innocence to clear Ballmer of wrong doing here. The owners probably still think he's a net positive regardless of this situation. They're probably more pissed that he got caught than doing what he allegedly did.

Yeah I bet the overall sentiment was "There's a much better way to do this without being so obvious"

Yup, it's just bad for everyone involved in the NBA. There are no winners coming from this.

The optics are obviously horrible but I will never underestimate the ability of people to just move on to the next story and forget however bad the optics are. Take a year for the investigation and pay people to downplay the whole thing and the outrage will slowly peter out. The nba had a ref scandal and we all moved on. So I think it is possible that if Balmer pays off enough of the right people to say there is nothing to it, it will eventually just fade away sadly.

[WWSRD]

Ballmer funding the construction of a brand new arena and spending mad money on his team is MORE important to the NBA than his issues circumventing the cap. They just are.

Ballmer is a STAR performer for the NBA and they won't compromise having him in the fold. People need to understand who's in charge here....and to a large extent, it's Ballmer.

The NBA need to hit him where it doesn't hurt......just fine him like 100million and re-distribute it between the other owners.

I don’t understand this line of thinking.

STAR performer? How many people watch the NBA because of Ballmer?

If he has to sell, another billionaire would take his place and nobody would care.

If anything, having just built a new arena is leverage against him. What’s he going to do with it if he’s stripped of his team?

Keeping him on could easily cost more fans than he ever brought in.

If you're running the NBA, Ballmer is a DREAM get for an owner.

He just PERSONALLY funded the construction of a 2 Billion Dollar arena. The biggest and best? arena in the NBA now. He's adding major infrastructure to your league and funding it with his own personnel wealth.

He's not just another billionaire. He's worth 106 billion. These other guys are worth 2-3 billion.
Think of the difference between being worth 2million to 100million. It's massive. This is the same and no, at that level it still makes a huge difference.

Not only that, Ballmer is extremely powerful and connected with his background as ex-CEO of Microsoft.

Ballmer took on a distressed asset in the LA Clippers and did everything he could to make them a real contender and PRIME-TIME showpiece for the league and TV audiences.

This is why Silver is trying to minimize this. He loves Ballmer. He loves having a guy with that kind of juice.

[PushDaRock]

Why would it not add anything when you literally just said it's a better way to fund the payments to Kawhi?

Because there's a legitimate cover for those expenses. Inflating costs is a far more typical way to launder money, precisely for the reason that it's harder to trace/distinguish.

Also, we are following the money trail here. If Ballmer had only invested 20m and Kawhi was getting paid 48m to do nothing. We can view the situation as being weird but cap circumvention is pretty difficult to prove here. But, we are now seeing more and more money that was thrown into Aspiration from Ballmer and the Clippers and that only increases the odds that some of it was being funneled off to Kawhi.

You can explain some of this stuff in isolation, but why would you do that? You have a mountain of growing circumstantial evidence that keeps piling up, it would make sense to use all of it to get the most informed view possible of the situation.

Remember, Pablo himself explained that two things can simultaneously be true:
1) Clippers are circumventing cap
2) Ballmer was scammed

What I'm saying is that these carbon payments specifically do not tip the scale towards #1. For me, the endorsement contract and stock options provide the bulk of the evidence for #1.

If the endorsement deal had been reasonable and had Kawhi done at least a few things or Aspiration had announced the sponsorship, there would be nothing amiss here. If I were an investigator, I'd train my eyes squarely on the 2 Dennises - that's the money they should follow.

It doesn't tip the scale because the scale is already tilted.

[inonba]

Clippers release a statement :



So Ballmer's going to spend another $100 million on another tree planting company just to show those payments were totally legit?

[PushDaRock]

Yeah I bet the overall sentiment was "There's a much better way to do this without being so obvious"

Yup, it's just bad for everyone involved in the NBA. There are no winners coming from this.

The optics are obviously horrible but I will never underestimate the ability of people to just move on to the next story and forget however bad the optics are. Take a year for the investigation and pay people to downplay the whole thing and the outrage will slowly peter out. The nba had a ref scandal and we all moved on. So I think it is possible that if Balmer pays off enough of the right people to say there is nothing to it, it will eventually just fade away sadly.

This won't go away because they can't just make an example out of Ballmer like they could with Tim Donaghy, Jontay Porter and etc. At the very least they need a fall guy for Ballmer.

[PushDaRock]

Clippers release a statement :



So Ballmer's going to spend another $100 million on another tree planting company just to show those payments were totally legit?

lol it would help his defense some if he can show himself punting away money to save the planet for no monetary gain.

[PushDaRock]

I keep seeing suggestions that the other owners might not care about a little salary cap circumvention. Maybe they don’t.

They definitely care about a little luxury tax circumvention.

Ballmer is essentially taking money from the other owners’ pockets, so unless he’s putting it back in some other deal, the owners are going to want retribution.

I'm not saying they don't care at all, only that they're probably more upset that he got caught than for the actual act itself. He's still net positive overall and he's a big part of the reason for why NBA franchises are worth as much as they are now.

[DelAbbot]

Does anyone actually think the NBA didn’t know something shady was going on with Leonard and the Clippers and most likely other teams?

The Raptors and Lakers notified them of the asks Uncle Dennis had - they “investigated” and found nothing. They care more about players gambling - something that shouldn’t even be a thing with sports which they allow.

Silver ruined the NBA and he doesn't even know it

[Zeno]

Yup, it's just bad for everyone involved in the NBA. There are no winners coming from this.

The optics are obviously horrible but I will never underestimate the ability of people to just move on to the next story and forget however bad the optics are. Take a year for the investigation and pay people to downplay the whole thing and the outrage will slowly peter out. The nba had a ref scandal and we all moved on. So I think it is possible that if Balmer pays off enough of the right people to say there is nothing to it, it will eventually just fade away sadly.

This won't go away because they can't just make an example out of Ballmer like they could with Tim Donaghy, Jontay Porter and etc. At the very least they need a fall guy for Ballmer.

That’s what college roommates are for.

[PushDaRock]

The optics are obviously horrible but I will never underestimate the ability of people to just move on to the next story and forget however bad the optics are. Take a year for the investigation and pay people to downplay the whole thing and the outrage will slowly peter out. The nba had a ref scandal and we all moved on. So I think it is possible that if Balmer pays off enough of the right people to say there is nothing to it, it will eventually just fade away sadly.

This won't go away because they can't just make an example out of Ballmer like they could with Tim Donaghy, Jontay Porter and etc. At the very least they need a fall guy for Ballmer.

That’s what college roommates are for.

I'm sure he will get a nice severance package