Kawhi Leonard Received Aspiration Payment Days After Clippers Minority Owner Investment

Los Angeles Clippers minority owner Dennis J. Wong made a nearly $2 million investment in Aspiration in December 2022 just days before the company paid Kawhi Leonard $1.75 million as required through his endorsement contract, according to a new episode of Pablo Torre Finds Out. The payment was made on December 15th, which was the same day the company laid off 20 percent of its employees. 

“It is beyond shocking, and I will tell you, I knew that the board (of directors at Aspiration) had put (in) money in December to make payroll and make rent… (so) it is not a rational investment that someone (Wong) would make,” one of two anonymous former Aspiration employees said on the podcast. “So it is very shocking to me that $2 million was made as an investment by Dennis Wong, who in my texts is identified as … Steve Ballmer’s partner a week before $1.75 million was paid to Kawhi.”

“There’s multiple things that are conspicuous,” said a second anonymous former Aspiration official. “One, we’re broke. We’re broke. So to invest in a broke company is beyond me. … And then the other thing is the amount that’s being invested, that’s such a nominal amount if we’re talking pure investment, especially in a late-stage startup that’s … already raised a year earlier $300 million (sic), what does $2 million buy you?”

According to Torre, Wong made a a confidential stock purchase agreement from Aspiration dated Dec. 9, 2022, in which his limited partnership DEA 88 Investments bought 0.072 percent of the environmental firm. 

“In all fairness to Uncle Dennis (Robertson), he’s not the only one who’s calling trying to get paid,” one of the former Aspiration employees said on the podcast. “There’s a huge freeze because there’s no money to be spent. So from the finance team’s perspective, we feel like we’re on the other end of collections calls. People are constantly coming in asking for their money.

“Between those months when all of this is missing – so September, October, November, and leading up to December, the actual certainty of the company even existing is up for grabs. At that point, are we gonna get paid as employees? Why does Uncle Dennis keep calling us? We have such bigger concerns that we’re thinking about, which is our own salaries. Are we gonna have to go through layoffs? Where is the money gonna come from?

“But lo and behold. Uncle Dennis gets paid.”

Adam Silver weighed in on the NBA’s investigation into possible salary cap circumvention committed by the Clippers and said the “burden” is on the league to prove the team actually committed wrongdoing in order for them to be punished.