The NBA's investigation into Kawhi Leonard and the Los Angeles Clippers for a possible attempt at salary cap circumvention through endorsement deals between Leonard and seemingly several teams at this point, though most notably the now-defunct green banking company Aspiration, is approaching a year in length with no sign of stopping anytime soon. 

It was initiated in September 2025 after a story was broken by podcaster and reporter Pablo Torre containing allegations about Leonard's dealings with Aspiration and over the course of this nearly year long process, a process that has involved the NBA interviewing with former executives of Aspiration before they faced sentencing for fraud for a matter unrelated to the allegations against Leonard, there has been very little progress. 

Their seemed to be a break in the case recently after ESPN reported that there was no evidence that Clippers owner Steve Ballmer had directly funneled money to Leonard through an endorsement deal with Aspiration worth $28 million, though that didn't clear the Clippers of wrongdoing for introducing Leonard to Aspiration in the first place, per the report.

No End In Sight

But any hope that ESPN's report would speed the process along was dashed when the NBA released it's own statement refuting ESPN's report, declaring that it contained inaccurate information that would be corrected when the NBA released it's own findings. 

So it now seems like everything is back to square one, especially after it was reported that sources told ESPN's Baxter Holmes that the investigation could continue into 2027 if the parties, those being the NBA and the Clippers, can't agree on the findings or proposed settlement to come at the end of the investigation, sending the matter into arbitration.

Why A Further Delays Are Bad

This scenario has been floated before, with it being proposed that Ballmer will fight tooth and nail against the NBA's investigation and use a third-party arbiter, a council made up of three members meant to be neutral that the NBA and NBPA have to agree on, to go over the investigation and agree on a concretely final verdict. 

While there is potential for some harsh penalties in this investigation, including a voiding of Leonard's contract, fines or loss of draft picks for the team and suspensions for any Clippers staffers found to be involved in any alleged salary cap circumvention, the biggest issue with the investigation is it's length. 

The investigation has paused the Clippers' attempted trade of Leonard to the Toronto Raptors and has reportedly slowed up their other attempts at signing players due to the uncertainty of the investigations end result, and more time added to the investigation only draws out these issues and slows up business for the Clippers and the rest of the league even more.