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A year after the NBA started its investigation into the Clippers violating salary cap rules, the league finally announced its decision. The penalties for the team were severe.
The Clippers will lose five first-round picks and be fined $30 million as part of their punishment. In addition, several Clippers employees will be suspended, including owner Steve Ballmer. Kawhi Leonard will have to pay $700,000 in restitution, and his uncle Dennis Robertson will be banned by the NBA from all business dealings.
Kawhi Leonard punishment winners and losers
Winner: Pablo Torre
Torre initially uncovered Leonard's cap circumvention details on his podcast, Pablo Torre Finds Out. The Clippers vehemently denied any wrongdoing. Ohers like Mark Cuban and Shams Charania initially came to owner Steve Ballmer's defense.
Cuban warned early on that Torre's coverage of Ballmer "is going to back fire on him." Cuban had to admit defeat after Wednesday's news.
Congrats Pablo. https://t.co/fOUfnbIlVw
— Mark Cuban (@mcuban) September 2, 2026Cuban was far from the only person eating crow. Others who questioned Torre look just as bad today.
— Freezing Cold Takes (@OldTakesExposed) September 2, 2026Torre's reporting proved to be ironclad. His Pulitzer from 2026 was clearly well-earned.
Winner: The NBA's small-market teams
There was a very real chance that the Clippers came out of the league's investigation relatively unscathed. Instead, commissioner Adam Silver decided to make an example, throwing the hammer down on Ballmer and the team.
Many fans have expressed apathy about the entire cap circumvention fiasco. But if the league simply gave a finger wag, then other deep-pocketed ownership groups would surely have started their own cap circumvention techniques. The richest owners would have left the smaller-market teams in the dust.
Silver's punishment sends a direct message instead that everyone is going to be on a level playing field. That's good for the league, the fans, and the parity that is important for teams that are not owned by the richest of the rich.
Winner: Kawhi Leonard and the Raptors
Leonard does have to pay a $700,000 fine. Considering that he was promised $66 million in no-show endorsements and pocketed a good chunk of that before Aspiration's bankruptcy, that's a drop in the bucket.
There was also speculation that Leonard's $50.3 million contract would be voided this season or that his trade to Toronto would get rescinded. Instead, he gets to keep that money, stay on a Raptors team that should be very good, and have an excuse not to visit Uncle Dennis this Thanksgiving.
The player's union was going to fight tooth and nail to make sure that Leonard was protected. And that fight could still be coming. But the league chose to target the Clippers more than Leonard, perhaps to avoid that future conflict. All things considered, his punishment was fairly lenient.
As for the Raptors, they are in a great position to contend for the title this year with Leonard in tow, as I wrote about last month.
Loser: The Kawhi Leonard and Paul George era
We already knew that the trade to pair Paul George and Kawhi Leonard was painful. The Clippers needed George in order to entice Leonard as a free agent, and they gave up Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and five first round picks to make it happen.
Now, after the Leonard punishment, the decision to pair those two is in contention for one of the most damaging moves in NBA history.
So like Kawhi cost the Clippers 10 firsts and Shai, am I getting that right?
— Shamit Dua (@FearTheBrown) September 2, 2026Hindsight is 20/20. At the time, the decision was mostly lauded. In retrospect, it looks awful.
Loser: Clippers fans
The biggest losers at the end of the day are the ones that deserve it the least. Clippers fans didn't ask Ballmer to circumvent the cap. They didn't ask the team to trade away SGA either. They've endured some brutally poor management, and that trend will continue if these penalties hold.
These punishments are going to be a functional death penalty for a Clippers franchise that needed the draft in order to pivot into the next era of the team. Keaton Wagler and Darius Garland are a nice guard tandem. Ty Lue and Jeff Van Gundy are elite coaches. They should be okay this year with Brandon Ingram and a collection of veterans. But this team has very little upside with future trades so encumbered and no hope of drafting a generational star. In the league, you're either selling wins or hope. The Clippers can't do either.
The Clippers could potentially get some of those picks back down the line. The Wolves lost five first-rounders back during a similar Joe Smith cap circumvention incident back in 2000. The league eventually gave back two of those picks for good behavior and compliance.
Still, it seems wildly unfair that the ones getting most punished at the end of the day are the diehards who have already put up with more than anyone should. It will be a great day when those fans are finally rewarded for their decades of suffering.
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