The Clippers‘ lone minority owner made a nearly $2MM investment in Aspiration while the company was in dire straits. The San Francisco-based environmental firm then made a $1.75MM quarterly payment to Kawhi Leonard on the same day the company laid off 20 percent of its workforce, Pablo Torre reports on his latest “Pablo Torre Finds Out” podcast as relayed by The Athletic’s Joe Vardon.
It’s the latest development regarding the potential salary cap circumvention by the Clippers. Last week, Torre broke the story that Leonard signed a $28MM endorsement deal with the company, then performed no work after Aspiration received a $50MM investment from Clippers owner Steve Ballmer. A subsequent report indicated that Aspiration agreed to pay Leonard an additional $20MM in company stock.
The NBA has hired a law firm to investigate the matter, and commissioner Adam Silver said on Wednesday that the burden of proof is on the league to find any wrongdoing by the Clippers.
Under the terms of the endorsement deal, Leonard was to be paid $1.75MM on a quarterly basis for four years. In December 2022, Clippers minority owner and vice chairman Dennis J. Wong made an investment of almost $2MM in Aspiration despite the fact that its independent auditor, KPMG, had resigned, and the company was already facing lawsuits worth millions for missed payments.
Aspiration missed a payment to Leonard in the fall before paying him in December, following Wong’s wire transfer to the firm, according to documents obtained by Torre. Payments to Leonard were marked as “critical.”
Leonard’s uncle and business manager Dennis Robertson had repeatedly contacted the company about the missed payment.
“There’s a huge freeze because there’s no money to be spent. So from the finance team’s perspective, we feel like we’re on the other end of collections calls. People are constantly coming in asking for their money. Between those months when all of this is missing – so September, October, November, and leading up to December, the actual certainty of the company even existing is up for grabs,” a former Aspiration employee told Torre. “At that point, are we gonna get paid as employees? Why does Uncle Dennis keep calling us? We have such bigger concerns that we’re thinking about, which is our own salaries. Are we gonna have to go through layoffs? Where is the money gonna come from? But lo and behold. Uncle Dennis gets paid.”
The Clippers issued a statement to Torre, which read, “The details of our relationship with Aspiration are under NBA investigation, but it is clear the company was a house of cards that defrauded Steve and many others. We look forward to sharing the facts with the league and providing them with all the information they need.”