[PTFO] What did Kawhi really know? And what does the U.S. government still WANT to know? New investigation premieres tonight at 8pm ET, only on our YouTube channel:
What incredible charisma and command of the room Kawhi has! Does he ever get paid to do sponsorships?
Even better, you get to pay him to not do sponsorships :D
He’s the equivalent of trying to sell tap water as an exciting beverage.
Isn’t this basically Liquid Death’s business model?
Aloysius O’Hare would be crying tears of joy
He has that quiet leadership trait. He doesn’t even need to show up sometimes!
I’m honestly still mad a mushroom company hasn’t thrown money at him yet.
That we know of.
Only one upvote? This comment is too clever for the likes of /r/nba
Are you forgetting Shaq exists? That dude will endorse literally anything and he’s just a monotone husk.
Kawhi knew Man City was just making up fake numbers, we want the truth!
As a fan of the Raptors, makes me nervous.
As a fan of drama, I’ve got my popcorn ready.
As a fan of the pelicans, I just want to watch the NBA world burn
I cackled
Respect
Fair enough.
Dumars about to do funny shit just wait on it
Player Hater of the year. Hate, hate, hate.
I was going to joke about forgetting Pelicans exsisted. But then I remember they did trade us Ingram which is used for getting Kawhi.
Man the last few years even I forget they exist sometimes. I got a bad feeling Kawhi is about to fleece you guys though. Got his big contract to play 30 games a year and ride off into retirement
You and me both
There’s nothing to be nervous about. The matter is settled. It’s irrelevant how much Kawhi knew. That’s the clippers problem
I mean nervous for what? The nba already gave out its punishment.
I guess public perception could get worse for him but at this point how much can that even change?
The utter irrationality of sports fandom means that now our fan base will go to bat for a fraudster and look just as stupid as Clippers fans during this whole saga simply because he’s on our team now. We’ve already had droves of fans in our subreddit wanting to sweep this under the rug and it’s only going to get worse as this discourse continues. Literally just look at all the Raptors flairs in this thread alone saying they want this over with. It’s embarrassing.
Teams and fans don’t care about the crimes a player’s committed, as long as they can score 30 PPG
Boy I wish the US Government would focus on a much larger, more pressing investigation instead
Think of how many more things they could be renaming.
back to the ABA baby
“American Raptors” (he’d also rename Toronto to America, and for some reason Google Maps and Apple Maps would abide)
I am a one issue voter and that one issue? Renaming things
They can do multiple things. Don’t let this crook off the hook
Can they? lol it doesn’t seem like it
They’re actively letting hundreds of worse crooks off the hook but yeah, this guy circumvented the NBA salary cap and we cannot let that slide
Then why aren’t they?
Don’t mean to spoil this for you, but the DoJ only did this specific thing for the headline.
Yes anyone can do multiple things at once but being able to do multiple things at once doesn’t mean you’ll be able to do them well or fast.
Not even the US govt has unlimited resources not to mention you can count on administrative or bureaucratic bottlenecks
Can they? Can they really?
Maybe he can help doing some journalistic work on the president’s ties to Epstein or the amount of money he’s earned while in office or if he’s a Russian asset. Surely that would have more impact than another piece on Kawhi.
Nothing Pablo can do that countless of journalists have already done in this arena. It’s up to us citizens to finally care about it on a deeper level than slight outrage
This exactly!!! Why is this such a issue with him ? And not to make this a racial thing but its always so easy to go after black people . The whole system is set up to go after black men .
If you he is a “investigative reporter” , go investigate something worth reporting.
No one cares about the clippers . Kawhi shouldn’t talk about integrity and leadership anymore . But fine him and move on
“not to make this a racial thing but I’m going to absolutely make it a racial thing”
As a regular listener of PTFO, Pablo is a very progressive anti racism guy. Race had nothing to do with him investigating this story. Kawhi cheated. The Clippers cheated.
They cheated ? The clippers didn’t win shit . Balmer basically paid kawhi to play for the clippers . Go after people who arent easy targets. Its annoying . He could actually put this energy to larger issues
I mean he obviously considers himself a sports journalist. You can argue the value that provides to the world is lesser than someone actively investigating more important issues, but he doesn’t necessarily have to investigate anything other than what he wants to investigate.
Kind of an insane take to turn Kawhi into a victim here. Yes, the system is 100% against black men.
But honestly? It isn’t really against Kawhi. At least not anymore. He cheated to earn \(30 million+, and walked away with a \)750k fine.
I agree . Im not trying to sound aggressive. You made some good points . I just think hes going after this like the world will be a better place . The clippers suck and balmer basically paid kawhi to come play for the clippers . They didnt win shit
oh shut up man lmao
You shut your mouth sir lol
Ok but seriously people need to stop going after low hanging fruit and put this energy into more important issues
He’s a sports reporter who is continuing to cover a story he broke about an unprecedented circumvention of leagues rules. He’s literally a sports reporter what else should he be covering?
I don’t walk into a Taco Bell and ask why their manager isn’t managing global affairs instead.
Hope this helps.
Ok i understand. Im not callin pablo a racist . Just saying that this energy could be put to better use . Kawhi isnt doin shit . Clippers aint winnin shit . He paid kawhi to play for a team no one wants to play for
Lets go!
There’s gonna be a Netflix doc about all this one day
I’d prefer the biopic. Lakeith stanfield as kawhi, Will smith as uncle Dennis, Adam Godley as Adam silver, and hasan minhaj as shams charania
Pedro Pascal as Ballmer
He’d have to bulk up a ton but holy shit Lakeith Stanfield as Kawhi would be amazing
That’s actually inspired casting.
H. Richard Green as Steve Ballmer.
Rachel Dratsch as Ramona Shellburne
John C Reilly as Pablo Torre
Wouldn’t he be a better Ballmer?
Nah we’re going full Tim and Eric universe for this. Eric is Ballmer, Tim is Adam Silver, John C Reilly is Pablo, David Liebe Hart is Kawhii, Neil Hamburger is Joe Sandburg, and Zach Galifinakis is Uncle Dennis.
produced by LeBron James
(He was producer on one episode of Untold and executive producer on the Redeem Team doc)
Kawhi deserves to be punished the same amount as everyone else involved
There is a reason why nba didnt punish Kawhi
Because it stopped Ballmer from having a realistic way to appeal his charges. Kawhi still deserves a bit of the hammer for trying/succeeding in extorting multiple offices.
This will embolden players.
The thing is, as shitty as it is that Kawhi basically walks free, the behavior correction needs to be and should be on the teams. Players can ask for the moon, it is on the organizations to make sure they’re complying with the rules.
I mean I am personally always going to think Kawhi is a greedy asshole, but none of this happens if Ballmer and the Clippers just tell him no like every other team apparently did.
Players can be as emboldened as they want, but they can’t actually violate the cap. Only the owner can do that. So the punishment needs to hit the owners much harder than the players to be a deterrent. Which it did.
There is no such thing as a bit of the hammer in the rules, It was a fine or Kawhi’s contract was getting voided. The latter was never option due to arbitration process.
It might, or it might scare off owners from running this scheme. It’s a bad precedent to stop someone from dictating what they believe their value is. It’s on those in the negotiating party to either provide a counter offer, report them (if it’s illegal or violates a CBA), or laugh them off.
Because the players association would’ve fought against it
Because its expressly stated in the CBA that a player can’t be punished more than a fine and voiding a contract for cap circumvention.
I’m also not sure you can suspend a player for cap circumvention
I’m not a lawyer but in the cba section about circumvention it talks about voiding contracts, suspending player agents but it never talks about suspension of the player. Unless players count as team personell but I don’t think they do. There could be another clause somewhere else that allows it. I just think they didn’t pull that trigger because it would allow arbitration and also punish the raptors
Players asking for things accomplishes nothing.
If the teams understand they can’t offer these things, the issue is closed.
Is it a big deal to fleece billionaires? I applause Kawhi
I think this is such an ugly opinion. Someone making way above 1%er territory just further enriched himself at the cost of normal people, every fan of a team that followed the rules and didn’t get Kawhi and every Clipper fan who now has to suffer the penalties, and you’re applauding it because he did it to a .000000001%er.
Fuck em both and the fans deserve better. Realistically these penalties barely effect either of the parties responsible and will rob multiple fanbases of 3-5 years
He did more than fleece Ballmer, he fleeced every clippers fan as well.
That is on Ballmer for not understanding the complex rules regarding this. Kawhi just took extra money a billionaire wanted to give away. Sounds like a no brainer to me.
It’s stupid to think that labor is the perpetrator here. This kind of rhetoric is siding with the owners.
It’s not incumbent on the players to make the owners follow the owner’s rules. Kawhi had to fire his agent, who was a bad agent. That agent cannot work in the NBA. That’s the extent of reasonable enforcement from the player-side anyways.
It’s not siding with either side, both agreed to break the rules both should be punished.
I mean I generally agree, but the CBA is agreed to by the players and the owners, it’s not just the “owners’ rules”. But the max contract portion of the CBA specifically forces top players to make less to the benefit of the worse players (who all have an equal vote in the union), so it’s not surprising that a player like Kawhii would feel he is worth more than the Clippers were actually allowed to pay him.
Right and so the agent took the brunt of the punishment as the person responsible for guiding a player through adherence to the CBA.
I don’t understand how saying that the player should have been punished with the owner is siding with the owner? That literally goes directly against what the commentor was saying. They didn’t say that labor is the only perpetrator.
Yeah, but the deal he took for punishment boxed Ballmer into a position where the only move he had left was to sue the NBA.
To me it really seems like this was the only path where real punishment was given to the team that broke the rules.
He was proportionally fined a higher amount than ballmer so are you asking for his punishment to be lessened?
He should be forced to pay back the full 66 million he made under the table.
There’s no enforcement mechanic for that and it’s a pipe dream.
The CBA states that he can be forced to pay back all the money gained from the cap circumvention.
That’s not the same punishment as everyone else involved.
It is, Balmer got the max fine he could receive, suspended for a year, most of the front office was also suspended without pay, and the clippers lost 5 FRPs.
A few weeks ago maybe, but not anymore
I think Kawhi agreed to snitch on the Clippers for a lighter punishment
Problem is that lighter punishment was a fine of 1% of what he made under the table. Thats not a punishment when you’re making as much as he is.
No he doesn’t.
Kawhi didn’t circumvent the salary cap. The clippers did
I disagree. I think the multi-billion dollar authority figure and the front office, also the authority of this situation, should be punished more then someone with no actual leverage asking for them to do something illegal.
A fine of 1% of what you made from breaking said rules is not a punishment
The Nephew needs to pay .
Ironically, the uncle also should pay.
Force him to play all 82 games.
Are these paid bots in the chat complaining about actual journalism uncovering corruption or just biased raptor fans hoping Kawhi doesn’t get into trouble?
Maybe a little bit of both. It’s like people misremember Watergate as being One singular moment where Nixon was caught and then he had to resign, when the truth was that Woodward and Bernstein wrote a crap ton of articles about the Watergate break-in in the aftermath. It was the slow drip torture that broke the scandal, much like Pablo Torre with aspiration.
All that is to say: the investigation is done when everything is found out.
fandom just be like that, those same raps fans probably were crowing for pablo to get kawhi a couple months ago lol
If they are actual people, I highly doubt they’d be taking their stance if Kawhi was on any other team’s roster.
Kawhi on Clippers : go scorched earth, burn everything to the ground
Clippers get chaos dunked and Kawhi is playing for the Raptors while other investigations are outstanding: STOP THE COUNT
It’s raptors fans… since the trade went through they’ve been ultra smug in this subreddit and in the clippers subreddit… it literally reminds me just how they acted during the World Series that they lost against the dodgers too.
The onus of defending kawhi and shitting on pablo has transferred from clipper fans to raptor fans. its been wild to see it happen in real time
Salty clipper fans more like it 🤭
Uh so you’re a fan of Adam silver or what no flair 😂
This is better than the regular season
Not sure why Pablo won’t attend these pressers and ask Kawhi some questions lol…
Did you not see how Raptors media personnel threw Leonard a bunch of softball questions during media day?
They don’t want to ruffle the feathers of their franchise GOAT and would promptly throw Torre out if he thought about attending a presser/media day.
They wouldn’t throw him out.
I’ve seen some conte this reporters grill cos CB es and athletes before. Pablo should do the same.
Toronto media wouldn’t throw Pablo out lmao get the fuck outta here
You think they would let him knowing who he is?
Yes… they’re not going to prohibit him from coming.
I’m all ears PT, literally
Kawhi said he only wants to talk ball. Take that US government. Case closed
Dragging it , when’s that poly and LeBron story coming out
Im livid as to why nobody is shitting on Kawhi. He is an adult, the excuse of sport athletes being uneducated, stupid and naive is way to overused. So they are excused to be barely functional human beings and exempt from consequences cause “they cant know any better”. Id say an adult earning millions has all the chances in the world to study something, ANYTHING and avoid falling prey of these schemes.
If he refuses cause he comes from a bad home, then guess what buddy? consequences.
He knew and if he didnt knew where those extra millions came from thats even worse.
I don’t think anybody thinks that. Reason he got off light was player’s association cut a deal with the league and didn’t challenge the ruling, so he Clippers have no one to side with them against the league office. Everyone knows Kawhi is guilty.
100% the right take IMO. Kawhi’s fake ignorance is a talking point for both the NBA and NBAPA. It’s pathetic and I really hope Pablo holds his ass accountable.
As I commented elsewhere in this thread, this kind of language is siding with the owners.
It’s not incumbent on the players to make the owners follow the owner’s rules.
I got heavily downvoted on a post trying to say this. I think Kawhi was unethical but ultimately the rule can only work if the owners agree to follow it because they hold the power to agree, the players can only ask and try. Kawhi is definitely not the only one to ever ask for under the table payouts, he only got caught because of how egregious and obvious it was. I choose to focus on Balmers role in all this because he chose to agree to what Kawhi asked because they wanted an advantage and were willing to do corruption to get it.
Why do you keep repeating this, its also the players rules. In the CBA in Article XIII. Cap Circumvention, Section 2. No Unauthorized Agreements, paragraph (b) on p. 340 says:
(b) In addition to the foregoing, it shall be a violation of this Section 2 for any Team (or Team Affiliate) or any player (or any person or entity controlled by, related to, or acting with authority on behalf of, such player) to attempt to enter into or to intentionally solicit any agreement, transaction, promise, undertaking, representation, commitment, inducement, assurance of intent, or understanding that would be prohibited by Section 2(a) above.
Y’all trying to make this a workers rights issue is fucking laughable and shows why corruption happens. Y’all allow the ones you like to be corrupt af
Workers taking under-the-table bonuses is the real corruption that ruins the world.
everyone shits on him constantly, where have you been?
Nah since the trade went through all I see is raptors fans glorifying him and making fun of the clippers and how our future looks thanks to kawhi and management… and yes it takes two to tango!
I mean the Raptors are the actual victims here since we were trying to keep a championship winning team together and lost out because the clippers shoveled money at a player under the table to scoop him up, so I think we can glorify whatever we want at this point.
Fuck the clippers.
lol what are you smoking please share with the rest of the room
I’m not really convinced Kawhi was ever staying with the Raptors unless they were the only team offering these shady under the table deals. Which altogether would have been a worse outcome for the team.
I get how you feel but ultimately it’s not like Ballmer lured Kawhi somewhere he had to tolerate for a few years until he could go back to Toronto.
Internet tough guy over here
Are you just as livid when Curry was partaking in crypto pump and dumps?
Dude took dark money from a billionaire, but it’s not like he was gonna play anywhere else if everybody followed cap rules.
> Are you just as livid when Curry
yes, i also loved lebron but now hate his china and israel comments, also the greak freak is definitely getting money from polymarket lol. Now what loser?
Lol I’m not that bothered by any of it because I’m not a tool who gets easily engaged by ancillary stories in a basketball league.
Who is saying that Kawhi doesn’t know better because he’s dumb? Lmao I think you made that one up yourself.
I think the point that it’s a victimless crime more or less. I’d agree he should probably get a year long suspension or thereabouts but the reason he didn’t is well documented
I legit see no flairs, raptors flairs, and clippers flairs saying kawhi knew nothing to extremely little about the outside money and it was all uncle dennis/ballmer in EVERY thread related to this investigation. It’s getting tiring.
Because he’s a big oaf athlete with no brains? That’s what the OP is supposing.
He’s willingly ignorant sure but I wouldn’t say “dumb”
Hey Pablo, we’re good. You can go home, kawhi’s here
Hey Pablito, the rest of us still want blood. Continue my friend.
Start with your president eh?
[deleted]
[removed]
This mf got away with it, and he knows it. We know it, and he knows that, too.
Greedy ass dude, was already rich. How much do you NEED bro? Whole planet is hurting right now but somehow these people keep making money.
Maybe we should all start cheating and being lying, conniving ass people.
That’s why he’s been on his PR run
Get over yourself lol. He didn’t take money that was meant to go to a charity or kids with cancer. He asked for more money and the clippers gave in.
No one got hurt. No one will suffer because of his actions. No one’s life was affected except a guy worth $200B
Every Clippers fan got hurt, they’ll spend the next decade in NBA purgatory
Nobody cares, blame the ownership for circumventing the cap and giving into Kawhi. Everyone asks for extras when they purchase cars, homes, hell even new jobs. It’s up to the management whether or not they go through with it AND if it’s legal.
He is a turd
Think the league has made it clear that cap circumvention is a team/owner offense and not a player one. Right or wrong, Kawhi isn’t getting punished.
Ahhhh shittt!!!
… I wonder what happens if Pablo just drops more stuff after the punishment has been given. Does double jeopardy apply?
Ahhhhh shit! Im hyped for 8pm now
Pablo is a dog on a bone
He better be on his best behavior in Toronto
my stories are on tonight
My question is, can the NBA actually do anything to punish Kawhi, even if something comes out for this specific case, seems like its closed at this point. This is a genuine question btw, I am actually curious, because based on the wording, it seems like the decision was final between the NBPA and the league office
Based on the wording in the CBA, the biggest punishment Kawhi can get is to pay the money back that he earned from the deals (which imo if he actually was aware of it all, he should pay all the money back). I don’t think there is any risk of suspension or contract being voided at all anymore.
I actually find I just don’t care anymore. I avoided this sub because this is all they would talk about. Clippers got hammered. There’s no enforcement mechanism to punish Kawhi any further. We done yet?
At this point this dude has to stay active on his feeds or else he’s gonna get wacked
We’re done when I say we’re done - Pablo “Heisenberg” Torre
Uncle Dennis is gonna have this guy assassinated.
“Only on our YouTube channel” 😂, the rat is running out of news lol.
Raptors & Clippers deserve this nephew. Get him Pablo
Why do raps deserve this lol
For the copious amounts of shit they talked on the Spurs when nephew was being shady on his way out of SA. You may have forgotten but most of us didn’t
Thank you but unlike Kawhi’s letter I actually mean it
You should see them showing up in droves on our clippers page and a quick skim through comments. The smug attitude reminds me of how blue jays fans were acting in the World Series against the dodgers….
Alright man yall have a generational player in Wemby lmao I think you’ve gotta your good karma
Nah brah Americans gotta have that victim complex just look at their elected President
Pablo got called a Lakers homer before for covering the Clippers scandal. He’s gonna get called a Canada hater next.
Nah its all good Pablo, no need to worry anymore my man
Gotta keep milking this till the tittie is dry
Milking it
So tiring 🥱
Attacking Kawhi, while Balmer is a repeat offender
This guy’s just obsessed now
I don’t understand why you guys complain about Journalism and then when people actually do Journalism you guys say they are obsessed
Make up your mind lol
Being obsessed is the only reason the story broke in the first place. Sort of the job of a journalist to not let something go
Gee I wonder what could make you think that, random Toronto Raptors Fan
he is a journalist dumbass, it’s his job
Unbiased obviously, no personal interest in kawhi not being punished
Ahhh this is so fun when its not happening to me anymore, enjoy Kawhi!
He’s so annoying and I hate Kawhi.
I’ll drag this on but only if you tune onto my youtube channel and hit the like and subscribe button!!!
Wait, someone is trying to monetize the thing they do for a living while still providing an important service!?! How terrible!!!
Pablo, I love you, you and the team deserve all the credit for the investigation, but let us have our man please 😭🙏
Cook this cornball, Pablo