The Kawhi Leonard-Aspiration scandal just took another hit. In a new joint statement obtained by Pablo Torre, three former senior executives at Aspiration (the company behind Leonard’s $28 million endorsement) blasted the deal as unjustifiable, claiming it ignored their objections, bypassed company review, and was never in the firm’s best interest.
“The Leonard Deal was presented to the company as a completed arrangement and executed by Mr. Cherny despite significant objections from members of this senior management team,” the execs revealed in a joint statement. “It did not reflect any strategy previously communicated to us, nor was it reviewed through Aspiration’s Investment Committee process.”
The statement was signed off by former Aspiration executives, including the Chief Legal Officer, Chief Technology Officer, and Chief Financial Officer, who reported directly to Andrei Cherny at the time. They claim that Cherny orchestrated the contract, despite massive pushback.
“The team expressed concerns at the time regarding the high cost of the agreement and its lack of alignment with Aspiration’s brand and business strategy,” the executives claim. “While subsequent marketing efforts were undertaken, they were ultimately discontinued and should not be interpreted as support for the deal itself.”
Kawhi’s endorsement contract was ill-advised from the start, and now the former Aspiration executives are saying that it’s difficult to justify.
“In our judgment, the Leonard Deal was not in the company’s best interest,” wrote the former Aspiration executives. “It was strategically difficult to justify then, and it remains so today.”
Steve Ballmer started with an investment of $50 million in the company, but later gave another $10 million during the peak of their downfall. Even more damning is that the Clippers’ minority owner, Dennis Wong, also “invested” in the company shortly before one of their last payments to Kawhi.
Leonard, who signed with the Clippers in 2019, has a history of making outlandish and illegal requests, and we can assume he asked the Clippers for similarly shady perks. No concrete evidence has surfaced that Ballmer used Aspiration as a front to pay Kawhi off the books, but it’s hard to ignore his ties to the company.
What’s even harder to explain is why Aspiration gave Leonard that type of contract to begin with. While some, like former Mavericks governor Mark Cuban, claim that Ballmer was scammed, the circumstantial evidence reveals a different story.
Not only was Kawhi’s deal for an unprecedented amount ($28 million in cash and another $20 million in stock), but it came with a clause that allowed him to opt out of any marketing obligations. Now, we know that it wasn’t handled in the typical fashion, with Cherny effectively skirting his own company’s investment committee.
What matters is the NBA’s judgment, and their investigation is still ongoing. From a glance, however, this doesn’t look good for the Clippers, and it’s looking increasingly likely that someone within the franchise knew what was going on.
This statement from Aspiration’s former executives only piles on more doubt about the legitimacy of Kawhi Leonard’s contract. The fact that it bypassed normal review and went forward despite internal objections paints a picture of a company (or, at least, the guy in charge) willing to bend its own rules for the sake of one deal. Whether or not the Clippers orchestrated it, the arrangement now looks even more suspicious, and the NBA’s case for discipline just got a little stronger.
