Steve Ballmer
Steve Ballmer's philanthropic organization gave a $1.875 million grant – worth just more than Kawhi Leonard's $1.75 million quarterly payments due from Aspiration – to Aspiration co-founder Joseph Sanberg's charity in 2024, more than a year after Aspiration's troubles became public and the Clippers said they stopped paying Aspiration, according to Pablo Torre.
Ballmer claims Aspiration defrauded him. Yet, even after the scam came to light, he still donated to the charity of the man running Aspiration?
This is the most damning revelation yet.
Perhaps, Ballmer will claim he wasn't involved in the donation. However, Torre showed video of Ballmer claiming to be involved in a grant-by-grant basis.
The circumstantial evidence in this case is a mountain.
Kawhi Leonard
Kawhi Leonard had the contractual right to sell back his $20 million in Aspiration stock for $20 million, according to Pablo Torre.
It's tricky to describe Leonard's compensation from Aspiration and its co-founder, Joseph Sanberg. Leonard reportedly had $48 million in deals, but it's unclear how much of the $28 million endorsement contract he actually received, and the $20 million of stock lost value as the company declared bankruptcy.
But if his stock deal had a clause allowing him to sell back for the full $20 million, that'd be quite the windfall.
It's unclear how long Leonard's "put option" lasted or whether he exercised it. So, we still don't know exactly how much he walked away with.
But his deals were even more favorable (for no work!) than previously thought.
Scandal
A current NBA head coach told Pablo Torre:
"This should be embarrassing for the league. I know teams do little side deals, but what happened here is so obvious."
Quite the quote.
I continue to sense mixed opinion within the league on just how mad everyone is at the Clippers and the prevalence/scope of salary-cap circumvention.
Jonathan Kuminga
There's no traction on a Jonathan Kuminga sign-and-trade, and the Warriors expect him to accept one of their offers by Wednesday, according to Anthony Slater and Shams Charania of ESPN.
A reminder of Golden State's reported offers:
3 years, $75 million with a team option
3 years, $54 million
2 years, $45 million with a team option
1 year, >$8 million (with implicit no-trade clause waived)
$7,976,830 qualifying offer
The qualifying offer expires Wednesday, so that is effectively Kuminga's decision deadline. If he lets the qualifying offer expire, he'd remain a restricted free agent – just without the unilateral ability to sign for one year, $7,976,830.
This report is basically the Warriors conveying they're done negotiating. Kuminga has been talking about accepting the qualifying offer – but hasn't actually done so.
Both sides are waiting for the other to blink, hoping for better terms before it's too late.
But the deadline is approaching fast.
Warriors
The Warriors are signing Al Horford (multiple years) and De'Anthony Melton, according to Shams Charania of ESPN. The long-rumored deals move toward completion, but with Horford expected to receive the taxpayer mid-level exception, Golden State is clearly delaying officially hard-capping itself at the second apron until the Jonathan Kuminga situation is resolved.
The Warriors did sign Gary Payton II (minimum), No. 56 pick Will Richard (four years, two guaranteed) and No. 52 pick Alex Toohey (two-way).
The only rumored name missing: Seth Curry. That could depend on Kuminga's final terms.
Jonathan Kuminga, Quentin Grimes
Jonathan Kuminga isn't attending Warriors media day today, according to Shams Charania and Anthony Slater of ESPN. Quentin Grimes didn't travel with the 76ers for their preseason game, according to Jake Fischer.
I don't mind the reporting. More information is generally good.
But this was always obvious and the treatment of this by some as major news reveals an implicit misunderstanding of what's happening.
Kuminga and Grimes are free agents. Why would there be any expectation they'd be with a team?
The Warriors haven't offered Kuminga a contract he has accepted. Ditto the 76ers with Grimes. If a team wants a player to participate in media day or travel to a preseason game, the team must pay the player.
Of course, Golden State holds matching rights on Kuminga, Philadelphia on Grimes. There are good reasons we associate each player with the corresponding team. But don't treat that link as the team being entitled to any services from the players.
Chicago Bulls
Even explaining why the Bulls are one of the teams most likely to hit their over (32.5 wins), John Hollinger of The Athletic can't help but make a hilariously piercing observation:
"Chicago isn’t good by any means, but it has enough depth that it should survive the regular-season slog in relatively good shape. My projections value 13 of their 15 players at above replacement level, with the 15th being rookie Noa Essengue. (The other one is, um, starting center Nikola Vučević. Let’s move on.)"
Unders
Of course, John Hollinger follows his piece on most likely overs with the teams most likely to go under their win-total line this season.
-Dan Feldman