The NBA has not discovered evidence that Los Angeles Clippers owner Steve Ballmer funnelled money through sponsors to Leonard in an attempt at salary-cap circumvention, ESPN reported on Monday.
The Clippers and NBA are negotiating a resolution to the investigation, per ESPN, which cited one source who said talks have been “spirited.”
The result of those negotiations could determine the fate of an agreed-upon trade of Leonard to the Raptors, which the teams put on pause in July, pending the result of the probe. Leonard and the Raptors are operating as though the trade will be finalized, per ESPN.
Initial findings of the probe were presented to the Clippers in late July, per ESPN.
The league is still digging into whether the introduction of Leonard to team sponsors violated rules prohibiting salary-cap circumvention while examining if the Clippers had a “failure to supervise” employees, per ESPN.
The Clippers have strongly denied that any rules were broken.
In a statement to ESPN published Monday, the Clippers said the team “introduced players, including Kawhi Leonard, to companies with which we had business relationships. Making introductions between players and team partners is both an ordinary practice by NBA teams and a common request of players and representatives.”
The statement also said the team did not “negotiate or dictate” the terms of Leonard’s endorsement deals.
“The fact that a player has an endorsement relationship with a company that also does business with his team is not evidence of salary-cap circumvention,” the statement said.
Leonard and the Clippers have been under investigation for 11 months since reporter Pablo Torre revealed an alleged no-show sponsorship deal between the player and environmental bank Aspiration, which has since gone bankrupt.
A second alleged no-show deal between Leonard and Daktronics, the Clippers’ scoreboard maker, has since also been reported by Torre.
Per ESPN, the NBA investigation has also focused on a third deal with Boingo Wireless, a provider for the Clippers’ Intuit Dome.