The Kawhi Leonard era must END…
#nba
The Clippers’ 2025-26 season ended on Wednesday when the Warriors beat them in the NBA play-in tournament, capping a wild year that began 6-21 before the team rallied to finish 15 games over .500 after trading away James Harden (to Cleveland for Darius Garland) and Ivica Zubac (to Indiana) at the February deadline. Kawhi Leonard, who just turned in arguably the best scoring season of his career at age 34 (27.9 points per game on 50/39/89 shooting across 65 games), went cold down the stretch of the play-in loss as Draymond Green smothered him defensively. When reporters asked Leonard afterward whether he saw a future in LA, he brushed it off with “let me cry about this loss a little bit more” and declined to commit either way.
Hanging over all of this is the NBA’s ongoing investigation into Leonard’s endorsement deal with the now-bankrupt Aspiration, a former Clippers sponsor. The probe, launched last September after Pablo Torre reported that former Aspiration employees believed the deal was a vehicle for owner Steve Ballmer to circumvent the salary cap and pay Leonard off the books, has been handed to the law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz. Leonard himself says he’s “not stressing” it and believes he’ll be in the clear, but the stakes are real: the most severe outcomes floated publicly include the possibility of his contract being voided, though momentum on that front appears to have slowed.
Contract-wise, Leonard is locked in for one more year at a $50.3 million cap hit before hitting unrestricted free agency in 2027, and he’s eligible to sign a two-year extension worth up to roughly $126 million starting the day after the NBA Finals. Clippers president Lawrence Frank publicly reaffirmed on Friday that the plan is to “win with Kawhi” and insisted Ty Lue’s job was never in question, but the Warriors reportedly inquired about Leonard at the February deadline and there’s an expectation those talks could get revived this summer. So the Clippers are at a genuine fork: run it back one more time with Leonard, Garland, Bennedict Mathurin, and Brook Lopez, or cash in his trade value now while he’s coming off a vintage season, with the Aspiration probe looming as the wild card that could upend either plan.
19 Comments
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Usually so down with ur takes but what did Kawhi do to u bro
They definitely should trade him, but I could see them keeping him and LA Clippers totally deserves this. The salary cap endorsement with Aspiration, thinking Beal was better than Powell, ending CP3's farewell tour, all the assets given to OKC so that OKC is exactly where LA wishes they were.
Just seems crazy to consider any of this until we know the result of and possible punishment resulting from the Aspiration investigation.
8:10 How are the two related? You say "The fact that Cooper came out of the Luka trade", but they don't have anything to do with each other.
LAC was dragging CP3 around the country to advertise his retirement year. Supposedly Paul became obsessed with outcoaching the coaches. There were snitches on the Clippers, and they convinced the GM to fire Chris Paul during a road trip… That's mean !! … Karma bites back if used improperly
are you a clippers or nuggets fan?
ur a clippers fan?
They don't own any of their own till 2029(top 3 protection on 29 1st though) due to Harden trade
As a Clippers fan, I would prefer to move off Kawhi this offseason. But, if he wants to stay on a team friendly deal because he loves LA and the organization, I'm fine with that. As long as we understand he cant be the best player on a championship team anymore
I mean yeah he's coming off a great season but this has Bradly Beal to the Suns written all over it. Idk which front office is stupid enough to bit
Kawaii for Jay Huff.!
7:55 don’t think so. #1 pick, AD, a first rounder, and Christie isn’t the worst for Luka. Still awful but guaranteed #1 pick thru NBA rigging is pretty sweet.
Much better than the PG trade even in the moment
Pretty sure the okc thunder have a 2027 unprotected swap
If they sign Kawhi to a long term guaranteed contract worth a butt load of money (say at least 6 years, no trade clause), I'm going to assume this is the punishment that the Clippers are taking on. The league doesn't want to say it's punishing the Clippers or that the Clippers actually did anything wrong, but the other owners would probably be mad if the Clippers didn't get punished in some way (not that they aren't doing similar things, but like, they aren't so dumb about it).
Cool hearing you speak off script not easy to do it 8 min straight. But you’re killing it👍
I mean the guy just had a 27.9 PER for an entire season along with a BPM of 8.0….that's MVP/superstar caliber numbers only topped by Joker, Shai, Wemby & Luka for this season.
Now he will be 35 by the beginning of next season (which historically, only Mike and LeBron have delivered a chip at that age as the best player on a team) but today's players are a lot better in their mid & late 30s than past players
Didn't even mention trading him before the NBA voids the contract and gives the death penalty to the Clippers.