New PTFO Live Watch: Latest Kawhi Leonard Investigation Revealed
Allegation: intuit dome’s jumbotron maker had a sponsorship deal with Kawhi, even though they are a b2b product that doesnt do any public advertising at all.
Really makes you wonder just how rampant it is in this league. Like, is Kawhi just the tip of the cap circumvention iceberg?
Do other teams give players a some sweeteners? Sure. But I honestly think the scope of the Kawhi backroom deals are an exclusive perfect storm because of Ballmer and Uncle Dennis. If other teams were regularly making 8 figure deals, we would’ve heard whispers at least. This is simply Ballmer and Kawhi’s camp being bold and stupid.
That’s the part that’s for me curious. We know the clippers did this shit but the severity of the punishment will determine just how widespread this is for me. The dragging of feet alone has me thinking this isn’t just a clippers thing because you’d think the others would be begging for a reason to knock Ballmer down a peg or two and yet, here we are.
I remember after the Kawhi/Aspiration scandal started, Andrew Wiggins did a post advertising some mac and cheese brand
This is the most normal thing ever. Can’t think of any star player who doesn’t do things like this.
Milwaukee paying Giannis brothers to be on the roster Lakers putting Luka’s people on their payroll Jalen Brunson taking less than the max while his father is employed by the Knicks What’s the difference? Because Kawhi is getting the money instead of his wife?
Brunson’s dad makes as much as the guy he replaced. The league literally investigated this to see if he was getting paid an exorbitant amount to make up for his son’s paycut. He was not. And they just won a title with him on the coaching staff.
Milwaukee gave up cap space and a roster spot to keep Thanasis on the team. So it’s not cap circumvention. Whatever they were doing, they were doing within the rules - taking all the disadvantages that came along with it.
No idea what “Luka’s people” are on the Lakers payroll. You’d have to say specific names.
He didn’t take a pay cut
Sure it may not technically be cap circumvention and it’s objectively not nearly as bad as Kawhi’s situation given the magnitude of money, but it all still falls within doing stuff under the table and intentionally out of the public’s eye as much as possible.
Did any commentators during playoffs mention anything about Brunson having his dad along with him? I feel that’d be a nice heartwarming story, right? Kinda sucks if you’re not related to any players and realize your coaching aspirations can be replaced in an instant like that. Actually reminds of MPJ in college where his dad sat on UW’s coaching staff all year while doing absolutely nothing. MPJ then transferred the next season anyway.
You do realize Rick Brunson has been a coach for 2 decades on various other NBA teams right? Including previously with Thibs before he came to the Knicks? Bc it sounds like you think they just called him and said hey man come pretend to coach?
“intentionally out of the public eye” Thanasis was on the roster and on the bench. that’s squarely in the public eye.
doing stuff under the table and intentionally out of the public’s eye as much as possible.
Both Rick and Thanasis were in the public eye from day 1. Brunson had also been the assistant coach of 4 different NBA teams prior to his Knicks stint, so none of your schizo rant makes any sense.
The difference is Kawhi and the Clippers introduced a 3rd party into their bullshit that did some no-no’s
Really didn’t even need to have the flair to know who you root for
This isn’t that hard to understand
Say what you will, but Thanasis actually played. Heck, he had multiple 20 point games
Brother these are multi million dollar deals with money going directly to Kawhi. You can’t equate that to the Lakers putting Luka’s personal trainer on the teams payroll or Rick Brunson being employed as a Knicks assistant, or Thanasis having a minimum deal despite being a fringe NBA talent. None of those are remotely the same
I bet you this happens a lot, like a lot, and I honestly don’t care personally 😂, multi millionaires making more millions under the table, idk just doesn’t seem as serious as other shit going on around the world and in the NBA tbh
Of course YOU don’t lol
Hey everyone, look at his flair and mock his ass
I didn’t care 10 months ago and I don’t care now, just give the result and move on, whatever it may be, I just want to see this shit over.
Bro, we know why you don’t care. Take the L on contention next year.
Also, this is the other side deal that Wachtell Lipton was investigating
The IRS should be going after this one.
The IRS that has been neutered by Musk/Trump? Doubt it.
They only turn a blind eye to billionaires or cherrypicked corporations. They still plan and go after people evading taxes for years.
Wow Kawhi didn’t play a lot of the games for the clippers too. I guess his M.O. was get paid without doing anything
Aspiration and RIFC weren’t sticking, found a new slant!
A third cap circumvention scheme has just hit featuring Jumbotrons
Sir a second fake sponsorship has hit the Clippers.
9 PM Eastern? Pablo usually releases stuff early in the morning. This is going to be juicy.
Prime time Pablo
Bro competing with the new episode of silo
Damn the new season is out? I gotta catch up
It’s pretty good so far man
Hall of Fame Game clears
Hall of fame game has always sucked ass
Daktronix had 60 years of no sponsorships at all. And for some strange reason, they decide the very first person to pay, is Kawhi Leonard.
Related, the Clippers are using Daktronix for their in arena scoreboard maker
Right as they’re on the verge of collapsing and then bailed out by the deal with Ballmer.
There is only a handful of principals able to provide these massive LED screen, Daktronics is just 1 of the bigger name in the industry. They supplied to most arena not just Clippers.
But yes they are B2B, there is absolutely no need for a public sponsorship. You everyday Joe aint gonna buy Daktronics.
Let alone a public sponsor who never shows up for any photos, never wears their gear, never even likes or retweets anything on social media. For millions of dollars.
(Sorry for the multi comment fuckery, I hate this website.)
Videoboard man gets paid.
Clever
I’d buy that shirt.
Kawhi was a “spokesperson” for Daktronics??
Daktronics is about to get nuked
No they won’t because it’s not illegal to help Ballmer circumvent the nba cap.
But clippers and kawhi do have more headaches
At this point I feel like the feds could hit Steve balmer and all his cronies with a RICO case
That’s an angle I hadn’t considered. I wouldn’t trust this DOJ (generally, but also to go after a billionaire), but interesting to contemplate.
At this point, I guess we need to search Kawhi’s home and find giant sacks of money labeled “secret illegal Ballmer money” to prove it to people.
That still doesnt sound like a smoking gun idk man
We’re going to need a couple years just to make sure
Relevant flair
Congratulations Kawhi, you’re still a Clipper, no hard feelings Ingram
I really feel like this does it for Kawhi. I always felt the team should hold the majority of the responsibility but this is now pretty bad on his side too.
Sidenote how much does kawhi wish he just did appearances. Hey at least this company isn’t under federal indictment.
Bro how much were they paying kawhi Leonard
The dollars per game figure keeps getting worse
It’s. So. Good.
Daktronics spokesperson is crazy crazy
Now THIS is way more potent to me than the aspiration saga, but it all makes a lot of sense now.
So much smoke there absolutely has to be fire
I would be curious to know who was buying up all the Daktronic stock in the time period when the stock miraculously was going up.
Wow, Kawhi really has a thing for secret deals. The league is going to set a dangerous precedent if they don’t come down on him hard.
Pause
BatBoy has walked into the Shituation Room
Pablo with a Vulfpeck shirt?
A man of taste if there ever was one
Ballmer and Silver bout to hire a hitman
This is way more damming than the Soccer reveal.
I don’t even really see what was damning about the soccer reveal. Rich ppl silent invest in tons of shit we don’t know about.
The implication is that Kawhi was given shares without actually making any contributions at a time when team had absolutely no value, but then the stadium was built with public money so the team now owns a very valuable asset. So if Kahwi sells his interest based on the new value he got money for nothing at the detriment of tax payers
I am not saying that is what happened, but it is the implication.
The crisis pr guy is a dumbass
Lmao this dude is about to get banned from the league and it’s deserved
Pablo Torre is the only person around the NBA who went to journalism school apparently
Easily one of the best episodes in the series.
This is one of the spiciest episodes since the first one
All these would have to be on his tax returns and can be easily audited by NBA. What am I missing?
Lmao Silver won’t do shit as cap circumventing becomes an agent based addon they start demanding.