I don’t have any interest in men’s professional basketball but this statement from Kawhi does not read as taking full responsibility at all lol.
I accept full responsibility for lapses in judgment by people within my inner circle and regret the distraction this situation has caused the fans and my family.
I don’t have any interest in men’s professional basketball but this statement from Kawhi does not read as taking full responsibility at all lol.
He’s made tens of millions of dollars and only Has to pay 700k. This means nothing to him. I think the league should have gone way harder on him for this.
He’s made tens of millions of dollars and only
Has to pay 700k. This means nothing to him. I think the league should have gone way harder on him for this.
They went after his agent. Presumably because he made those deals and not Kawhi directly. Not that I'm in any way convinced Kawhi didn't know what was going on but I do get it.
They went after his agent. Presumably because he made those deals and not Kawhi directly. Not that I'm in any way convinced Kawhi didn't know what was going on but I do get it.
The big penalties: The Clippers shall forfeit five first-round draft picks, one in each of the 2029, 2030, 2031, 2032, and 2033 NBA Drafts. The Clippers are fined $30 million. Clippers owner Steve...
The big penalties:
The Clippers shall forfeit five first-round draft picks, one in each of the 2029, 2030, 2031, 2032, and 2033 NBA Drafts.
The Clippers are fined $30 million.
Clippers owner Steve Ballmer is suspended from all league and team activities for one year for knowingly seeking to help Mr. Leonard obtain off-court income opportunities, for approving a business deal that he knew was a precondition for Aspiration to enter into an endorsement agreement with Mr. Leonard, and for his failure to create conditions under which his organization abided by the NBA’s circumvention rules.
In connection with his violations, Mr. Leonard is required to pay the league $700,000.
Kawhi definitely seems to have gotten off relatively scott-free, and won't be restricted from moving to the Toronto Raptors this year. The Clippers organization is absolutely fucked draft-wise for the next five years though
I'm not an NBA fan, but I have found the outcome of this to be incredibly interesting. This feels like the equivalent of nuking a franchise for the scale of the punishment. I feel as if they are...
I'm not an NBA fan, but I have found the outcome of this to be incredibly interesting. This feels like the equivalent of nuking a franchise for the scale of the punishment. I feel as if they are being made an example of in order to scare others who may be flirting with the idea to not do it. Honestly, if that's the case it is quite refreshing to see a professional sports team receive a punishment that is more than a slap on the wrist.
Note that the crime here is not some form of direct in-game cheating, but finding a way to pay players more money than what ownership and the players union settled on in the CBA. The NBA (like...
I feel as if they are being made an example of in order to scare others who may be flirting with the idea to not do it. Honestly, if that's the case it is quite refreshing to see a professional sports team receive a punishment that is more than a slap on the wrist.
Note that the crime here is not some form of direct in-game cheating, but finding a way to pay players more money than what ownership and the players union settled on in the CBA. The NBA (like most American sports leagues) is a cartel, most owners are there as much to make a profit as because they like the sport, and the salary cap limiting what can be spent on players is a big part of why owning a team is profitable. You can safely assume the owners of the other teams were very upset about this, and the league commissioner operates at the behest of the owners.
Most sports team punishments for cheating seem like wrist slaps because they are. This isn't a punishment for cheating, it's a punishment for threatening the cost control measures of an enormously profitable cartel. That's the difference.
I think you’re conflating two things. The salary cap really is there for competitive balance. If you want to think about it from an investment point of view, it’s reassurance that you can have...
I think you’re conflating two things. The salary cap really is there for competitive balance. If you want to think about it from an investment point of view, it’s reassurance that you can have your time in the sun, and not just constantly get outspent by the lakers and whatnot.
The actual amount of money players and the teams get is presplit. Players will always get half of basketball related revenue. The dollar figures you see in contracts is actually fake - they go back and normalize against the actual basketball revenue after the year is done and that’s what they actually get paid (usually about the same, to be clear, but mechanically that’s how it’s done).
The salary cap doesn’t change how much teams spend on players.
The salary cap is both a competitive balance measure and a cost control measure. It's effective at both, but the later is by far the dominant reason why ownership groups have worked so hard to...
The salary cap is both a competitive balance measure and a cost control measure. It's effective at both, but the later is by far the dominant reason why ownership groups have worked so hard to install them.
Technically for the NBA it is the enforced 50/50 and not the salary cap that is holding down player expenditures, but I don't think it makes much sense to view them as meaningfully discrete mechanisms. They work together. The clippers, of course, circumvented both in these under the table payments.
Major sports leagues which don't negotiate cost control systems (whether that's the direct revenue splits and salary caps, harshly limiting salaries of players entering the league, or both) wind up spending much larger percentages of their revenues on players. European soccer leagues, for example, as a rough rule of thumb view spending 70% on players as a reasonable sustainable target, and many teams will exceed that because the rewards for success (and the costs of failure) are so substantial. This makes these soccer leagues much more stratified in terms of have and have nots in a way that can feel alien to American viewers, but 1) there are different levels of success that teams can attain such that every fanbase has cause for hope, fear, and interest, and 2) a much larger portion of the money these teams generate and their owners feed back in via player salaries is exposed to taxation and ultimately comes back into the larger economy.
It looks like this isn't the Clippers' first time doing this (and getting caught), which makes the harsh penalties make more sense. The punishment on Leonard seems extremely light in comparison....
It looks like this isn't the Clippers' first time doing this (and getting caught), which makes the harsh penalties make more sense. The punishment on Leonard seems extremely light in comparison. Just a fine (that is certainly less than what he made off of this) and no actual punishment makes this a wise business decision for him, which is probably not what the NBA wants to encourage.
From what I've seen people discuss about it, the bargaining agreement with the players union prevents punishing players for collusion, there's no mechanism for it. The league can go after the...
From what I've seen people discuss about it, the bargaining agreement with the players union prevents punishing players for collusion, there's no mechanism for it. The league can go after the ownersgovernors (rolleyes) just fine, as they're doing.
Probably didn't help his case that ESPN had a suspicious story a month ago with "insiders" (perhaps from the Clippers?) saying no punishment would be doled out, and now the SEC is looking in to one of the companies involved with the sponsorship deals.
Part of that is that it's the franchise's penance for actively finding side-deals for Kawhi so that they can pay him outside the "cap" on total player salary. So that's a Steve Ballmer thing, and...
Part of that is that it's the franchise's penance for actively finding side-deals for Kawhi so that they can pay him outside the "cap" on total player salary. So that's a Steve Ballmer thing, and even though he has more money than God herself, he will HATE being banned from his toy team for a year. And now is toy is broken for a long while. Say it ain't so...
The story behind this is way deeper and more interesting and won a Pulitzer. This was uncovered because a company called Aspiration filed bankruptcy and released a list of its creditors, which...
The story behind this is way deeper and more interesting and won a Pulitzer. This was uncovered because a company called Aspiration filed bankruptcy and released a list of its creditors, which included Kawhi. The show is absolutely incredible and turned into a fifteen part series and going:
I don’t have any interest in men’s professional basketball but this statement from Kawhi does not read as taking full responsibility at all lol.
He’s made tens of millions of dollars and only
Has to pay 700k. This means nothing to him. I think the league should have gone way harder on him for this.
They went after his agent. Presumably because he made those deals and not Kawhi directly. Not that I'm in any way convinced Kawhi didn't know what was going on but I do get it.
His agent is (in)famously his uncle. He’s been a character in kawhis career arc since the spurs.
The big penalties:
The Clippers shall forfeit five first-round draft picks, one in each of the 2029, 2030, 2031, 2032, and 2033 NBA Drafts.
The Clippers are fined $30 million.
Clippers owner Steve Ballmer is suspended from all league and team activities for one year for knowingly seeking to help Mr. Leonard obtain off-court income opportunities, for approving a business deal that he knew was a precondition for Aspiration to enter into an endorsement agreement with Mr. Leonard, and for his failure to create conditions under which his organization abided by the NBA’s circumvention rules.
In connection with his violations, Mr. Leonard is required to pay the league $700,000.
Kawhi definitely seems to have gotten off relatively scott-free, and won't be restricted from moving to the Toronto Raptors this year. The Clippers organization is absolutely fucked draft-wise for the next five years though
I'm not an NBA fan, but I have found the outcome of this to be incredibly interesting. This feels like the equivalent of nuking a franchise for the scale of the punishment. I feel as if they are being made an example of in order to scare others who may be flirting with the idea to not do it. Honestly, if that's the case it is quite refreshing to see a professional sports team receive a punishment that is more than a slap on the wrist.
Note that the crime here is not some form of direct in-game cheating, but finding a way to pay players more money than what ownership and the players union settled on in the CBA. The NBA (like most American sports leagues) is a cartel, most owners are there as much to make a profit as because they like the sport, and the salary cap limiting what can be spent on players is a big part of why owning a team is profitable. You can safely assume the owners of the other teams were very upset about this, and the league commissioner operates at the behest of the owners.
Most sports team punishments for cheating seem like wrist slaps because they are. This isn't a punishment for cheating, it's a punishment for threatening the cost control measures of an enormously profitable cartel. That's the difference.
I think you’re conflating two things. The salary cap really is there for competitive balance. If you want to think about it from an investment point of view, it’s reassurance that you can have your time in the sun, and not just constantly get outspent by the lakers and whatnot.
The actual amount of money players and the teams get is presplit. Players will always get half of basketball related revenue. The dollar figures you see in contracts is actually fake - they go back and normalize against the actual basketball revenue after the year is done and that’s what they actually get paid (usually about the same, to be clear, but mechanically that’s how it’s done).
The salary cap doesn’t change how much teams spend on players.
The salary cap is both a competitive balance measure and a cost control measure. It's effective at both, but the later is by far the dominant reason why ownership groups have worked so hard to install them.
Technically for the NBA it is the enforced 50/50 and not the salary cap that is holding down player expenditures, but I don't think it makes much sense to view them as meaningfully discrete mechanisms. They work together. The clippers, of course, circumvented both in these under the table payments.
Major sports leagues which don't negotiate cost control systems (whether that's the direct revenue splits and salary caps, harshly limiting salaries of players entering the league, or both) wind up spending much larger percentages of their revenues on players. European soccer leagues, for example, as a rough rule of thumb view spending 70% on players as a reasonable sustainable target, and many teams will exceed that because the rewards for success (and the costs of failure) are so substantial. This makes these soccer leagues much more stratified in terms of have and have nots in a way that can feel alien to American viewers, but 1) there are different levels of success that teams can attain such that every fanbase has cause for hope, fear, and interest, and 2) a much larger portion of the money these teams generate and their owners feed back in via player salaries is exposed to taxation and ultimately comes back into the larger economy.
It looks like this isn't the Clippers' first time doing this (and getting caught), which makes the harsh penalties make more sense. The punishment on Leonard seems extremely light in comparison. Just a fine (that is certainly less than what he made off of this) and no actual punishment makes this a wise business decision for him, which is probably not what the NBA wants to encourage.
From what I've seen people discuss about it, the bargaining agreement with the players union prevents punishing players for collusion, there's no mechanism for it. The league can go after the
ownersgovernors (rolleyes) just fine, as they're doing.Probably didn't help his case that ESPN had a suspicious story a month ago with "insiders" (perhaps from the Clippers?) saying no punishment would be doled out, and now the SEC is looking in to one of the companies involved with the sponsorship deals.
Part of that is that it's the franchise's penance for actively finding side-deals for Kawhi so that they can pay him outside the "cap" on total player salary. So that's a Steve Ballmer thing, and even though he has more money than God herself, he will HATE being banned from his toy team for a year. And now is toy is broken for a long while. Say it ain't so...
The story behind this is way deeper and more interesting and won a Pulitzer. This was uncovered because a company called Aspiration filed bankruptcy and released a list of its creditors, which included Kawhi. The show is absolutely incredible and turned into a fifteen part series and going:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLp43H6Vt_yDoUarxNb_fVK9_6bSiA2aHo&si=o66aZRkHtAUTZ_pw