The NBA has suspended Los Angeles Clippers owner Steve Ballmer for a year and imposed a $30 million fine and the loss of five first-round draft picks after finding the team breached salary-cap circumvention rules in its dealings with star player Kawhi Leonard.
The sanctions, announced on Wednesday, 2 September 2026, follow an independent investigation by the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz into endorsement arrangements involving Leonard and four companies linked to the Clippers.
Ballmer was found to have “knowingly” sought to help Leonard secure off-court income worth millions of dollars. The NBA also said he approved a business deal he knew was a precondition for Aspiration Partners to enter into an endorsement agreement with the player.
The Clippers must forfeit a first-round pick in each of the 2029, 2030, 2031, 2032 and 2033 NBA drafts. The organisation and its personnel will also be subject to five years of compliance monitoring overseen by the league.
Gillian Zucker, the Clippers’ president of business operations, has been suspended without pay for one year after being held primarily responsible for the endorsement arrangements and for providing false and misleading statements to investigators.
Lawrence Frank, the team’s president of basketball operations, has been suspended without pay for six months. The NBA said he was involved in the arrangements and approved improper expenses incurred by Leonard and his family.
The investigation found what Wachtell, Lipton described as “a pattern of misconduct and multiple significant rules violations” by an organisation that had previously breached the league’s salary-cap circumvention rules.
According to the findings, the Clippers helped initiate commercial opportunities between Leonard and Aspiration Partners, Boingo Wireless, Daktronics and Lockton Insurance. The team was also accused of facilitating endorsement agreements, offering the companies business in return for deals with Leonard, paying personal expenses and failing to report improper approaches made through his then-business manager, Dennis Robertson.
Leonard has been ordered to pay the NBA $700,000 over violations linked to Robertson’s conduct. Robertson, who is Leonard’s uncle, has been barred from conducting business with NBA teams, their affiliates, players or personnel for five years.
The NBA and the National Basketball Players Association have agreed that the penalties are final and binding. Commissioner Adam Silver said the punishment reflected what he called “flagrant violations” and “institutional and leadership failures” at the Clippers.
The Clippers rejected the findings, saying: “We vehemently reject the NBA’s findings.” The team said the investigation was “heavily biased” and had been conducted to support a “predetermined narrative rather than facts and evidence”, adding that it intended to challenge the penalties through arbitration.
Leonard said through his new agent that he accepted responsibility for “lapses in judgment by people within my inner circle”, but insisted he had entered into his Clippers contract and the related agreements in good faith and had no knowledge of any plan to circumvent the salary cap.
The conclusion of the investigation could now allow Leonard’s proposed move to the Toronto Raptors to proceed. The reported trade, which would return him to the team he led to the 2019 NBA championship, had been placed on hold while the league’s inquiry was completed.
“As I return to Toronto, I am focused on what I can control, closing this chapter, and moving forward with a clean slate,” Leonard said.
