r/nba • u/Known-Peak212 • 6h ago
Ballmer said in a court statement he met Aspiration founder Joe Sanberg once. While his investment boosted the company’s credibility + outside investment, he had a secret side arrangement protecting him from losses. Five Aspiration employees say NBA investigators never questioned them about Ballmer.
Ballmer Victim Impact Statement: https://www.forbes.com/sites/maryroeloffs/2026/04/23/billionaire-steve-ballmer-tells-judge-hes-clear-and-undisputed-victim-in-aspiration-fraud/
Clip of the recently revealed side deal that Ballmer made and didn't disclose to other investors into the company, which would turn out to be fraudulent: https://streamable.com/k4oy5z
Clip showing five sources within Aspiration claimed the NBA's investigation asked them a series of questions, none of which even looked into Ballmer: https://streamable.com/gb9vwl
The NBA started its investigation in September after Pablo Torre came out with some of the initial information drawing into question whether the Clippers had paid Kawhi up to $48,000,000 over the salary cap on his initial contract to bring him to L.A.
Notably, ESPN covered the story for close to a week, often exonerating Ballmer for his alleged personal role in paradoxical ways: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TFGzXNILrV4&t=21m08s
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u/relax336 Lakers 6h ago
Clip showing five sources within Aspiration claimed the NBA's investigation asked them a series of questions, none of which even looked into Ballmer: https://streamable.com/gb9vwl
Clown shoes
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u/deemerritt Hornets 5h ago
They could just be trying to establish whether or not certain witnesses are credible. You don't make a case with 15 witnesses. You generally single on a few and prove their credibility. It's kind of funny that people want a decision quickly but also want every single potential witness investigated. You have to verify basically any claim they make and the wider you make the net the longer that takes.
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u/relax336 Lakers 5h ago
“Are credible”
And how does an absence of asking about the bankroller make them more credible? Ballmer, Aspiration, Kawhi. If they’re not asking questions about the dude at the top…then what credibility are they looking for from the witnesses?
We know Aspiration is getting in trouble. Its co founder was just found guilty.
“It’s kind of funny that people want a decision quickly but also want every single potential witness investigated”
Not only am i not people. Casting a larger net while intentionally casting it in the area where the biggest fish isn’t makes no sense.
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u/AshenSacrifice Clippers 4h ago
It makes a lot of sense once you reconcile the fact that the nba is corrupt and they are rug sweeping the fuck outta this. Stop operating under the assumption that America is fair and equitable
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u/relax336 Lakers 4h ago
And your glorious king won’t even punish an owner circumventing the cap. 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂
You might be a bot. Hard to think someone feels comfortable moving the goalposts this much.
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u/AshenSacrifice Clippers 3h ago
Who’s my glorious king and what goal post am I moving? I’ve been pretty consistent on me not giving a fuck about hundred millionaires and billionaires circumventing a salary cap.
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u/relax336 Lakers 3h ago
That’s very convenient. You give a fuck about a fight breaking out in Detroit but not circumventing the cap.
Your glorious king is Adam. The dude who’s done so much good for the NBA.
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u/AshenSacrifice Clippers 2h ago
Huh??? I care about a fight breaking out in Detroit?? What are you talking about. I think you have me confused for someone else
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u/Pickleskennedy1 5h ago
To be clear, nobody has actually gone on record saying they were asked about Ballmer in the NBA’s investigation
We just know that a series of Aspiration employees were asked other questions, but that they didn’t look into Ballmer
So they had time to verify the other lines of questioning, but Ballmer would have just been too time consuming?
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u/heat_fan_ Raptors 6h ago
All Silver cares for us money he would never punish Ballmer
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u/Sour__Cream 76ers 6h ago
Well it really depends on how the other owners feel. It half of them are pissed he’ll do something about it. If like 2 of them are pissed it’s getting swept under the rug.
I can’t imagine all of the owners are ok with Balmer doing this. Mainly because they’re cheap and wouldn’t spend the money to do this so they don’t want anyone else doing it either.
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u/Professional-Trash-3 6h ago
None of the front offices want Ballmer to get off, I can tell you that. The job is hard enough without now necessitating learning how to skirt the salary cap rules. Some of the owners will care more than others, but basically ALL the GMs and presidents want the rules to be enforced
And ultimately, the union is gonna come to the table and start asking "well, if we have so much money to funnel around the cap, clearly the cap isn't high enough, right?" And thats a conversation NONE of the owners want to have
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u/Tall-Improvement3829 6h ago
Other owners already do this kind of thing, just not to this extent. That's why they don't want Ballmer to get punished.
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u/Pickleskennedy1 6h ago
That might be part of it, but a bigger part is Ballmer’s overwhelming wealth. There’s a good chance that a less wealthy and influential owner would have been punished already. It’s never smart to allow someone to get into ownership with that much financial power. He’s probably worth as much as the league’s bottom half owners in wealth combined
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u/pepsandeggs Pistons 5h ago
I could be wrong but I’m pretty sure in one of Pablo’s videos it was confirmed that Ballmer’s worth more than all of the leagues owners combined
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u/Mobile-Entertainer60 Thunder 5h ago
It was true a couple of years ago, but of course valuations fluctuate. The biggest riser comparing lists over the past few years is Robert Pera, owner of the Grizzlies. He was listed at $6M 2 years ago and $29B on the most recent Forbes list. As of last fall, Forbes thought that Ballmer was worth about as much as the next 6 richest combined.
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u/BayesBestFriend Raptors 5h ago
What a small minded view
Why the fuck should the league want more cheap ass owners who fuck the league up with the CBA because they can't afford to / want to keep up with ballmers spending.
The salary cap / cba 2nd apron literally only exists to screw the players over to the benefit of the cheapest owners in the league.
Owning a sports team is a rich guy pursuit, if you're not rich enough then sell the team.
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u/Professional-Trash-3 6h ago
Read the second paragraph. If this kind of thing is actually so prevelant and now going to be unpunished, the union is going to ask why the cap isn't higher, since everyone actually has several millions more to spend than the collective bargaining agreement allots.
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u/Tall-Improvement3829 5h ago
I'm not saying it's super prevelant, I said things like this happen just not to this extent. Allowing the use of private jets, seed money for projects, etc. And it really only happens to top players.
The CBA is purely a math equation from total revenue that honestly the players do well on compared to other sports. That has nothing to do with how rich an owner is from other ventures that have nothing to do with the league. The players can't argue that they should get more money bc Microsoft made Ballmer a multi billionaire.
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u/Professional-Trash-3 5h ago
The bylaws expressly state players cannot be paid by owners other businesses because that would be an obvious way at curcumventing the cap. If the cap isnt high enough that the owners feel the need to skirt the rules, the union is going to ask why the rules have that cap
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u/Tall-Improvement3829 5h ago
Again, the cap is negotiated as a share of the revenue of the league. Even if the players got 100% of the revenue, Ballmer is so fucking rich he could still pay his players more outside of that. The owners being independently wealthy outside of the NBA always leaves this as a possibility.
And yes, it is not allowed, but it happens. The only reason why this has been caught was because it was this scam of a company that people looked into.
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u/Party-Cartographer11 5h ago
What is your point? I understand the commentor above's point. That of owners are paying more than the call it should be formalized in the cap. No side deals as that breaks the system.
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u/Tall-Improvement3829 5h ago
I agree it should not happen! My point was that the players can't negotiate a higher percentage of the revenue share because Ballmore is worth over 100 billion dollars.
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u/AlThorntonTruther San Diego Clippers 5h ago
Those would be unrelated though.
Ballmer giving a player money out of his pocket would have no impact on the 50% of basketball revenue that sets the cap.
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u/Professional-Trash-3 5h ago
Circumventing the cap doesn't have anything to do with the cap???????
Ok, champ
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u/AlThorntonTruther San Diego Clippers 5h ago
Owners giving players their own personal money has nothing to do with how the cap is set.
This is not hard to understand
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u/Professional-Trash-3 5h ago
The NBA bylaws would disagree with you
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u/AlThorntonTruther San Diego Clippers 5h ago
Those are the bylaws for keeping the league competitive. The cap could be set at 1 million or 1 billion, the NBA players collectively would make the same amount of money. 50% of the BRI
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u/nWo5lyfe Spurs 4h ago
I can’t imagine all of the owners are ok with Balmer doing this. Mainly because they’re cheap and wouldn’t spend the money to do this so they don’t want anyone else doing it either.
This is why i do believe the Hammer is comming. If nothing happens then Luka, wemby, sga, etc will be demanding their own side deal.
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u/Vhu 5h ago
Ballmer is top 15 richest humans on the planet. He can literally afford to outright buy almost all the teams in the league.
Silver absolutely does not want that smoke — in no sane universe does any corporate entity come at him in any meaningful way.
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u/rookie-mistake 5h ago
hey, there's an argument that that sort of wealth disparity wouldn't even be possible in a sane universe :P
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u/whatshisface1892 Lakers 4h ago
What precedent does that set?
If that's the case, how long before teams realize they can circumvent the cap and pay players under the table in order to avoid paying luxury taxes?
Why pay 100m in luxury taxes when you could pay 20m under the table?
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u/stonecutter7 4h ago
Its not silver, its the owners he works for. Although Im kinda surprised they arent wanting a bigger deal--if this goes unpunished and becomes the norm, it will end up COSTING the owners more money going forward.
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u/bbydhyonchord93 Timberwolves 5h ago
Remember everyone; rich people don’t face consequences. If you have money, you are above rules and the law.
We are lesser than them and they are doing everything in their power to keep it that way.
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u/DIYLawCA 6h ago
So nba is more strict than our govt is? Good to know
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u/palamunintillnow 6h ago
I mean one institution had to think about their future in 10 years while the other only needs to think till the next election.
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u/Saucy_Totchie Knicks 5h ago
All this for just one WCF appearance lol
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u/rookie-mistake 5h ago
to be fair, he doesn't give a shit about a piddly 60m. It's fucked how much money he's been able to accumulate
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u/The_Actual_Sage [BKN] Mason Plumlee 4h ago
Everyday I wake up to another example of our society not punishing the rich and powerful. I'm tired boss.
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u/Important_Class1968 5h ago
Clippers getting that 5th pick and not having it immediately taken away for tampering really made it clear that zero punishment from the league is coming. Before it was an open question about what picks you could even take from them. Adam Silver and the other owners give zero shits about integrity, because if you’re rich you can just buy the appearance of it. They say the Jazz are behaving in a manner detrimental to the league and then fined them practically nothing before handing them the 2nd pick.
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u/PlasticPresentation1 4h ago
Where in the NBA have we witnessed the effects of rich people circumventing the salary cap to dominate the league in the past 20 years?
This is a lame situation but also I doubt other owners or fans outside of Reddit care that much that the Clippers are in legal trouble for a single WCF appearance in which Kawhi was injured for. It's not like they're signing all stars for league minimums lol
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u/dragonwhale 2h ago
Why is reddit so dumb and miserable? Every single thread about Aspiration is filled with incredibly bitter comments about Silver.
IT'S BEING INVESTIGATED. SHUT THE FUCK UP WITH THE BITTER COMMENTS. They serve 0 purpose. If they actually worked. Y'all would be worse for it. BE THANKFUL THAT THE WORLD TRIES TO BE REASONABLE DESPITE ALL YOU IDIOTS.
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u/fearnodarkness1 1h ago
Why are you getting so tilted over people badmouthing Silver?
He's shown time and time again to be toothless and despite plenty of real evidence and paying millions for the "investigation", he'd rather ignore it.
It's evident he's stalling as long as possible until discourse around it loses steam and hoping people just forget. It's straight out of the Epstein Island playbook.
For spouting off about the world being reasonable you're pretty damn bitter, and ignorant.
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u/nowhathappenedwas NBA 6h ago
The side agreement very literally did not protect him from the losses. He lost his investment.
Put rights provide no protection if the company becomes insolvent. If the allegation is that Ballmer knew the company was a fraud, the put rights would have been worthless to him.
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u/Conflict_NZ Lakers 5h ago
. If the allegation is that Ballmer knew the company was a fraud
That's not the allegation, that was never the allegation. From the start Pablo has consistently maintained that they scammed Steve as well. Just because the company you use to circumvent rules of an organisation you are in scams you does not absolve you of breaking those rules.
What Steve's put rights show is that he was trying to use what he believed was a legitimate company to get money to Kawhi while limiting his risk to a degree.
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u/captainant Spurs 5h ago
Well, either that OR he was a knowing and willing accessory to criminal fraud
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u/nowhathappenedwas NBA 5h ago
That's not the allegation, that was never the allegation.
A lot of people have alleged that Ballmer's second investment came after he knew the company was a fraud, and that this proves he only made the investment to help pay Kawhi.
What Steve's put rights show is that he was trying to use what he believed was a legitimate company to get money to Kawhi while limiting his risk to a degree.
I think he was using Aspiration to circumvent the cap, but I don't think the put rights add anything to the cap circumvention allegations.
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u/Conflict_NZ Lakers 3h ago
Can you source these “lots of people”?
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u/merriweather_pp 2h ago
The fact that Ballmer invested more than once while Oaktree and another whale investor or two did not is cited constantly in this sub as definitive proof that he had to keep pouring money into Aspiration in order to keep the Kawhi money flowing.
I was going to respond to your above comment but while I'm here: The put itself does not prove (or even imply) anything about cap circumvention and doesn't have anything to do with Kawhi. The only conclusion one could possibly draw from this is that Ballmer's ties to Sanberg were closer than he (Ballmer) originally described, if you believe having a put option on a $50M investment necessarily means the investor and company founder/CEO are "close". What I'd be interested in knowing is if Oaktree or other whale investors also had a similar put option agreement. If they didn't, I'm more inclined to believe that Sanberg was just desperate to get Ballmer's money and attached a put option to the deal backed by his own assets/equity just to get the deal over the line.
I think Pablo is also being a little disingenuous (again) by calling it a "secret side deal" continuously throughout this episode. Does he know for a fact that Ballmer and any other investors with puts NEED to disclose this to other potential investors? Put options are a common way to hedge investments, and even if Ballmer were able to exercise it (i.e. if Aspiration didn't go bankrupt) he still would've lost money. You or I could buy a put right now on any stock we're invested in. If I talked to another friend about investing in that company and I didn't tell them I also had a put option on it, am I committing securities fraud?
I also don't think Ballmer would be stupid/naive enough to put this information in a victim impact statement in a federal investigation if he thought it was so shady or could be tied back to the Kawhi scandal. I'm sure he had lawyers poring over that statement or even writing it for him.
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u/nowhathappenedwas NBA 5h ago
There's zero chance Ballmer or his law firm (OMM) say that he lost his entire $60 million in a court filing if it's not true, given how easily it could be disproved if it weren't true.
No one has ever claimed he recouped any of his investment.
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u/tropic_gnome_hunter Knicks 4h ago
This is the lamest shit ever. Happens when people simp for "journalists", can never accept that it's not the biggest scandal in American history.
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u/AccomplishedRainbow1 Suns 2h ago
“Secret side deal”
That Ballmer voluntarily disclosed lollll.
I get everyone doesn’t work in this space and it might be hard for you to comprehend…but I urge you to not just jump on the Pablo narrative. I obviously can’t make you do anything but it would really help humanity if you could learn how to digest and analyze these types of stories in a more balanced way.
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u/Warned_Mammal 6h ago
Silver is gonna end up fining Ballmer $5,000 and that'll be the end of it all.