2025-26 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

yeah, the story will be that ballmer didn't know, and just...c'mon, man. it's your job to know. if you invest 50 million dollars with a company, make sure it's not the same one that gave 48 million to a player on a team you own to do nothing and who can't collect if they switch teams. this isn't hard to not do.

 

And that same company has a direct sponsorship deal with the Clippers... They also tried to bid double what Intuit did for the naming rights to the Clippers. So not only did they have a Kawhi-deal, they had a deal with the Clippers... So you would think that Ballmer, having ownership of the Clippers and a sizeable % of Aspirations would know what the hell was happening internally.

"In September 2021, the Clippers announced a $300 million partnership with Aspiration, which included sponsorship for the team’s new arena and jersey patch rights."

$300 million is a s*** ton of money.... That's the type of money you hire your team of lawyers to figure out if this company is legit and can honor the contract both long/short-term because you don't want a fraudulent company being plastered on your jerseys and the arena...

How is Ballmer going to claim he was bamboozled on something THIS big? Either he's an incompetent businessman (which he is not) or he allowed it to happen. No other way to explain the massive incompetence here!

 

Agreed with most here. This is not something that can be justified no matter how many long posts or novels are written. This entire mess needs to be dealt with in the harshest of manners or an already crappy league is going to get worse. On a happier note, we have Luka.

 

Pause

first off I was in a front office and ownership group of an NBA team.

I got certain players pre draft workouts.

Dont get it twisted.

Klay Thompson was in my group with Alec Burks who was drafted by Utah.


Kawaii came in a week prior. This wasn’t superstar Kawaii he couldn’t shoot.

I’m an entrepreneur. One of my small investments was a limited partnership with NBA team.

I’ve given information I have an action sports skateboarding background.

I was a Football player. Not a basketball player.

My guys

Jrue Holiday

Brandon Jennings

Klay Thompson

I got hooked up with Jordan Farmar through a girl I dated on the UCLA Volleyball team.

 

Sounds like a great idea for a court for 2k

 

If addressed to me, maybe Wino too ..... we are legit asking. To my recollection when you were asked the first time you only mentioned the Skateboard parks and sponsorships. And to this point had just hinted with little detail about FO knowledge of stuff. Which above now you are confirming. Very cool. And can understand why you would not want to name names or team(s).

 

Let me be clear.

I’ve just given information about how this can turn out for the Clippers.

independently giving my opinion and support info on Steve Ballmer.

I honestly think he was being an overly supportive owner of his player. And found away to invest in a team sponsor that was tied to kawaii.

Steve Ballmer would not risk his teams ownership to make this move.

Basketball wise buisness wise it makes no sense.

This isn’t as good as Kawaii Leonard is not Kawaii in his prime kind of past his prime.

On his last big contract so Why would this Owner risk all this to pay Kawaii some more money off the top???? Absolutely makes no sense.


If you want to be real about this s*** the Clippers are in NBA no man’s land they weren’t paying Paul George and It was Kawaii and really good role players.

s*** at that point it made more sense to tear it down. The Clippers don’t have a Luka Doncic.

would this move make sense if it was Anthony Edwards absolutely or Gianiss.

So I don’t see the basketball logic.

As I stated the team already signed him to a max contract in 2019.

 

Tough to take you seriously when you call him Kawaii instead of Kawhi.

 

I appreciate that. Yes. It was alot of fun. I gave up my College Football playing career to embark on a very fun NBA journey. And I’ve met amazing people on the way. So guys like Kawaii they are like people you see as rookies and now it’s like wow.

Mychal Thompson did hit my shoulder and said you better pick my son. I tried. And that night in the Tunnel Stu Lantz walked by me and didn’t say anything. Funny off topic Kareem Abdul Jabbar has said more to me in the tunnel in basketball then Stu Lantz lol and if you know about Kareems public run ins that’s comedy within itself.

 

I always do it. It’s in my phone Writing.

 

Yes spot on.

This will be structured as Kawaii having his own independent deal. They were both swindled.

Ballmer had no idea that is what it looked like. He lost 50 million.

And he’ll get a reckless penalty I still think they are going to lose a draft pick.

 

I’m gonna give yall a little something.

Everybody knew Kawaii was coming back to L.A. in 2019.

Toronto never had a shot. It was the worst secret in NBA circles.

Kawaii wanted to be a Laker when he demanded getting traded out of San Antonio.

Pop hated the Lakers and absolutely did not want to do that deal.

Kawaii was pissed.

Toronto was strictly a rental.


Uncle Dennis was pinning the Lakers against the Clippers.

I absolutely thought he was coming to the Lakers it was a done deal. Lebron thought he was coming to the Lakers.

Clippers slipped in and got it done. That’s why I point to the recruitment of him there as the foul play in terms of negotiating a deal.

Jeanie wasn’t going for that under the table b******* uncle Dennis was talking.

and then Clippers got the deal done with the trade for Shai.

Nobody wanted to trade Shai everybody knew that was Jerry’s last swan song in a list of players that went from Shai to Kobe everybody knew he was going to be great. You could see it in the Golden State series.

Any other NBA that trade would never happen.

Kawaii forced it and now we see with the Toronto reports. He wanted to play with his boy Paul George for some reason.

I always go to Paul taking that max and then demanding the trade.

so everybody was shocked when he chose the Clippers.

 

I’ll say this Steve Ballmers penalty is Shai.

that kawaii trade he structured. Destroyed his franchise.

6 draft picks

Shai Gilleus Alexander

Jalen Williams

Carson Wallace

I don’t care what anyone says Basketball wise that’s hard to recover from.

 

You hooked up with Jordan Farmar? I don't need to know these things bro.

 

all true, but again--what if he succeeded? who says the next owner to completely ignore the rules won't be wildly successful? and we'll only punish after we know whether it worked? that's like waiting to blow the whistle after seeing if the shot goes in. a foul is a foul.

they need to lose more picks and/or the ability to trade picks. don't worry about fines; they'll do nothing to ballmer. make their tax/apron caps 7 million lower for the next 4 years. this is the only way you deter future f***ery, imo.

 

yeah, this spineless piece of s*** isn't going to do anything

 

It’s not ok to cheat. But we have to be realistic about these things. I don’t see where the appetite to bring Balmer, the clippers and Kawhi to justice will come from.

The players association will protect Kawhi. Owners see Balmer as good for their pockets over the long term due to team valuations and him paying lots of luxury tax. The commissioner is spineless and doesn’t want to rock the boat.

The media is pushing this right now because it’s getting them attention and clicks, but in our society of 10 second attention spans, when the next story arrives, will this blow over? Probably…

 

I thought it was just a misspelling of my favorite Hawaiian Island...lol.

 

Hey man you ain’t gotta be a troll or hater. Clearly you must not get a lot.

My girl I was dating was on the UCLA Volleyball team and introduced me to Jordan Farmar before the draft. We became friends and he came to my skateboarding event. I’ve known Jordan since high school at Taft and we have mutual friends Steve Smith who came in with me as a freshman playing football at USC. So you could be funny and stuff but just acting like a wise guy it’s not cool.

Jordan Trevor Ariza who I personally know are the L.A. guys who were in my 2003 class Jordan was 2004.