{"id":2127945,"date":"2026-09-04T14:15:31","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T11:15:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2127945"},"modified":"2026-09-04T14:15:31","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T11:15:31","slug":"the-bounce-just-how-bad-are-the-clippers-penalties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2127945","title":{"rendered":"The Bounce: Just how bad are the Clippers penalties?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Bounce Newslette<\/b>r<\/strong>\u00a0\":basketball:\"<\/span>\u00a0| This is The Athletic\u2019s<\/em> daily NBA newsletter.\u00a0Sign up here<\/a>\u00a0to receive The Bounce directly in your inbox.<\/p>\n

The plan for today was to complete the Bounce position rankings with the top 40 forwards in the NBA. Then the league decided to give us the punishment for the LA Clippers. So we\u2019re pushing the forward rankings to Tuesday\u2019s edition. Yes, Celtics fans, Jayson Tatum is a forward, and that\u2019s why he wasn\u2019t in the wings rankings, just like last year.<\/p>\n

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Hammer time<\/h3>\n

Rating the severity of Clippers penalties<\/strong><\/p>\n

Adam Silver and the NBA finally levied a punishment<\/a> on the Clippers on Wednesday after 364 days of an investigation into allegations of salary-cap circumvention. To catch you up, the Clippers were accused of getting no-show endorsement deals for Kawhi Leonard for millions of dollars. Leonard and the Clippers had been investigated before<\/a>, but it never led to any sort of penalty. That is, until Pablo Torre decided to unleash an incredible investigation into Leonard and a company called Aspiration.<\/p>\n

The NBA\u2019s findings led to the largest punishment for a team in league history<\/a>. It surpasses the league\u2019s discipline of the Minnesota Timberwolves back in 2000<\/a> when they were discovered to have circumvented the salary cap for Joe Smith. The league has taken away half a decade of LA\u2019s first-round picks, suspended the owner and executives, fined Leonard and banned Dennis \u201cUncle Dennis\u201d Robertson from conducting NBA business for five years.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Let\u2019s go through each penalty<\/a> and levy a Clippers Punishment Adjudication (CPA) score for this devastating accounting issue by the franchise and Kawhi\u2019s representation. It\u2019s a scale of 1-to-5 \ud83d\udd28 emojis, with five being the most severe.<\/p>\n

First-round picks in 2029, 2030, 2031, 2032 and 2033 were stripped.<\/strong> This is the heaviest of the punishments for the Clippers. We\u2019ll get into how severe their draft situation is below, but taking away five first-round picks is entirely detrimental for roster construction. We don\u2019t know what the draft\/lottery system will be after 2029, but we know the Clippers won\u2019t have much of an opportunity to participate in it until 2034. Not only does this affect bringing in cost-effective, young talent, but it also hurts their ability to make trades. That\u2019s brutal in the second-apron era. CPA score: <\/strong>\ud83d\udd28\ud83d\udd28\ud83d\udd28\ud83d\udd28\ud83d\udd28<\/p>\n

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Suspensions for owner Steve Ballmer, business executive Gillian Zucker and president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank: <\/strong>Ballmer is suspended for one year from all team activities (aside from signing checks and paying bills). Zucker is suspended for a year without pay, and it appears that giving misleading information<\/a> to the NBA\u2019s investigation was a big part of that. Frank is suspended for six months without pay but will be back during the regular season. We remind you he got a contract extension back in January<\/a>. This is actually a pretty devastating suspension for Ballmer, who cannot even attend games. CPA score: <\/strong>\ud83d\udd28\ud83d\udd28\ud83d\udd28\ud83d\udd28<\/p>\n

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Clippers fined $30 million: <\/strong>It\u2019s the biggest team fine in league history, surpassing the Wolves\u2019 $3.5 million fine for the Smith debacle. According to a very lazy Google search, Ballmer\u2019s net worth is $152.4 billion. To put that into context, that fine is like $19.68 for someone making $100,000 a year. CPA score: <\/strong>\ud83d\udd28\ud83d\udd28<\/p>\n

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Leonard fined $700,000: <\/strong>This was the most laughable aspect of the punishment. Leonard could have had his $50 million contract for this season voided. Instead, he pays the league 700k. It\u2019s a lot of money, but consider that he made well over $20 million just from the Aspiration deal. And apparently, there were three other companies \u2014 Daktronics, Boingo Wireless (shoutout to airport WiFi 15 years ago!) and Lockton Insurance \u2014 paying him as well. CPA score: <\/strong>\ud83d\udd28<\/p>\n

Clippers subject to compliance monitoring program for five years: <\/strong>The NBA will possibly monitor the team for five years to make sure this doesn\u2019t happen again. Does this matter? CPA score: <\/strong>\ud83d\udd28<\/p>\n

Uncle Dennis banned for five years: <\/strong>This is the second most-laughable aspect of the punishment. Uncle Dennis was \u201cfired\u201d by Kawhi back in June, and Leonard is his only known <\/a>\u201cclient<\/a>.\u201d CPA score: <\/strong>\ud83d\udd28<\/p>\n

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“This is the largest punishment in the history of the NBA.”<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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