Pablo Torre Finds Out - Steve Ballmer's "Inconceivable" Donation, the $20 Million Guarantee and a Head on a Spike: Kawhi-Gate, Part V

Episode Date: September 29, 2025

Media Day will force Kawhi Leonard to respond to scandal, but not before Pablo returns with new scoops and urgent questions: Just how easy was the "no-show" payday? Did Uncle Dennis really act alone? And why did the richest owner in sports keep funding a fraudster, even as the feds closed in? Mr. Amin Elhassan joins as an increasingly sweaty one-man cast of experts.• Part IV: Steve Ballmer, the Other Cuban and the $118 Million Infusion• Part III: The Mystery Investor, the No-Show Payday and the "Smoking Gun"• Part II: Team Ballmer vs. Team Sh*tting Bricks — an Argument with Mark Cuban• Part I: The Richest Owner in Sports, the Silent Superstar and the Rotten Apple Tree• Subscribe: Pablo's newsletter has exclusive access, documents and invites(Pablo Torre Finds Out is independently produced by Meadowlark Media and distributed by The Athletic. The views, research and reporting expressed in this episode are solely those of Pablo Torre Finds Out, and do not reflect the work or editorial input of The Athletic or its journalists.) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to Pablo Torre finds out. I am Pablo Torre, and today we're going to find out what this sound is. Steve Balmer's kink is being robbed. Rob me blind, daddy. Right after this ad. I don't know whatever it is that you're planning to do. I mean... I'm just here to contribute and to answer everything that's allowed within the limits of the law, of course.

wearing a suit and tie. What should I address you as? Mr. Elahassan. Mr. Elhassen. Mr. Elhassen, thank you for being in a podcast court today. Thank you. I do want to start by acknowledging that your client, David Samson, you're running mate typically in these endeavors, is not here.

He's attending, unfortunately, to a family emergency. We send him our thoughts. Yes. The upside, though, is that he can't fiddle with the shit I put in front of you. Please, please don't fiddle. Little drumming, a light drumming, let it know I'm here. So where we are today is a special day. Yes.

Mr. Alhassen, it is NBA Media Day. It sure is. We are dropping this episode as a surprise for everybody who might be engaging in the festivities. For those who have no idea what the festivities are, could you please explain Mr. Alhassen, in case they did not work in a basketball front office in an executive capacity, as you have? What is NBA Media Day? NBA Media Day, Mr. Tori, is essentially a kind of show and tell for the world. Look at our new team.

Look how excited we are. This guy lost all this weight. That guy was playing there. Now he's playing here. Everyone's happy. We're going to win a title. We've started a brand new era in our organization. It is basically the day where you put your team on Showcase and all the media entities,

both local and national, come in, take pictures, ask questions, and essentially feel very positive about the year ahead of us. Yes. Well, for most teams. The team that we are focusing in on today, of course, is a team whose owner, I am told, Steve Balmer, the richest owner in all of sports, one of the 10 richest people in the world,

will not be participating in Media Day at all. But it is, despite that, the one day when Kauai Leonard, and, in fact, the Clippers president of basketball operations, Lawrence Frank, a gentleman, you must have encountered at one point in your journey through the day. They are going to have to field questions about this now five-part investigative series that I have been pursuing in a way that they may never have to again.

I'd like to pause right here and make clear to everybody that Mr. Balmer's lack of availability is not out of the ordinary. Typically you don't hear from owners on media date. However, as you mentioned, Lawrence Frank, Taran Liu, and Quay Leonard will. all have to speak to the media and I have to assume that the gathered media of which will be local and as I said, national and perhaps even international, we'll be somewhat curious about the findings that you've been publishing over the last few weeks. And so I just got to jump in here to interrupt Mr. Elhassen for a second to acknowledge that, yes,

there have been a lot of findings over these last few weeks. And in this episode, part five of our investigation, we're going to get into new details about the 48 million dollars that Kauai Leonard was supposed to get from Aspiration and the role of his personal camp in that deal, as well as new details about the deepening connection between Steve Balmer and the co-founder of Aspiration, all of which will be germane to the NBA's investigation. But the other big reason we're doing this here is because we actually want to acknowledge our detractors. And in doing so, we want to simplify the story. The story of what our reporting suggests is the largest salary-capsor convention scheme in sports history.

A deeply elaborate and complicated effort to bend a cardinal rule that was designed to regulate the unfair extra spending of billionaires. And that's a rule, by the way, that too rarely exists otherwise in American life. And yet I want to make the case here that this was also a very stupidly straightforward operation in some key, elemental ways as a current NBA head coach reached out to tell me this week. Quote, this should be embarrassing for the league. I know teams do little side deals, but what happened here is so obvious. End quote. What does that summary sound like to you, Mr. El Hassan, that perspective from that head coach?

It sounds like that head coach would like a pound of flesh, because how Adam Silver adjudicates this matter has reverberations that go far beyond what happens to the clippers. It is essentially the head on the spike you put outside the city gates of King's Landing to let everybody know, don't try that shit around here.

Well, it is almost as if caps or convention as a concept itself is on trial. That is the test in front of the commissioner. Of course. If, you know, I've done a lot of reading over... Are you Southern? I'm detecting a southern accent as you... It will emerge, Mr. Torre, from time to time,

as I turn into my lawyerly self. You're opening a laptop now. I am opening a laptop so I can reference Article 13 of the collective bargaining agreement, aptly named circumvention. Two key phrases. Compensation from a sponsor, business partner, a third party, substantially in excess of the fair market value of any services to be rendered by the player for such sponsor, business partner, or third party.

party and then the other part. Violation of the sections named above may be proven by direct or circumstantial evidence, including but not limited to evidence that a player contract or any term or provision thereof cannot rationally be explained. As Adam Silver gets up and speaks to the media and makes it seem like, well, it's shades of gray and we don't want to infringe upon corporate sponsors. And, you know, I've heard a lot of things have come to me. And then when we investigate, it turns out it was nothing at all.

I think as a matter of fundamental fairness, I would be reluctant to act if there was sort of a mere appearance of impropriety. I think the goal of a full investigation is to find if there really was impropriety. He's making excuses where there are two pieces of literature in there that are very clear. I dare say that this is what that head coach was talking about, that this is what lots of GMs that I've talked to and owners, by the way, have been referencing is just this very basic premise of the rule of NBA law, which is, again, not real law, but it is, in fact, a rule.

And all of this alleged rule-breaking, Mr. Elhassen, begins with Aspiration co-founder Joe Sandberg and his fellow co-founder and CEO, Andre Cherney, and how they, according to the documentation, signed Kauai Leonard to a secret $48 million deal that nobody ever announced or mentioned in public, in which Kauai contractually did not legally have to do. a single thing and, as far as I can tell, and as exactly zero people have publicly disputed, did not actually go on to do a single thing. Except, Mr. Alhassen, there was the one thing that Kauai Leonard was obligated to do,

according to the covenant of his contract, to secure those 48 million bucks. What was it? Mr. Leonard had to keep playing as a Los Angeles clipper. If you will now open up your folder and just reread for us, another bit of the legal literature here, Section 2.10b, Clause 2 of Kauai's endorsement agreement, signed in the middle of the 2021-22 NBA season with this now clearly fraudulent tree-planting brokerage company thing.

Company shall have the right to terminate if Leonard is no longer an employee of the team for any reason. Which is to say that this no-show deal in which Kauai would do nothing and, in fact, still get paid more than New Balance, his sneaker sponsor paid him. And also, by the way, more than four times what aspiration paid Drake and Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert Downey Jr. and the rest of its celebrity

A-list roster combined, this deal is a deal that, I believe, cannot, quote, rationally be explained. Does not represent fair market value, according to the language of the CBA, which you read for us. It feels like it's enough to punish the Clippers, frankly, right now.

But the rationale from the Clippers is what I want to turn my focus to today, Because it continues to be that Kauai's deal with aspiration was made completely and totally independently of Steve Baumers' $50 million personal investment in aspiration, as well as aspirations $300-plus million, quote, founding sponsorship with the Clippers, which, of course, Mr. Balmer himself recently explained away

as, quote, a whole bunch of complicated stuff. Through that, we had many relationships with the company, sponsor, activation was through carbon credits, all a bunch of complicated stuff. I love how he says carbon credits with great exaggerated aircuts, carbon credits, whatever that crazy shit is. Just that you spent in the end, according to our reporting, tens of millions of dollars on prepaid in ways that we have established in previous episodes. But the point here, Mr. Alhassen, is that much of what I've been doing for the last month now

has been an attempt to just anticipate and even reconcile the possible responses from both my critics, the people who poke holes in my reporting, as well as the richest owner in sports himself. I do want people to steal man, as they say, steel man, opposite of straw man. Steal man the critiques here. And so I've heard from Mavericks Minority owner Mark Cuban. I've heard from former aspiration CEO André Cherny, and I've heard from a growing rolodex of NBA sources who do request anonymity

because in many cases, they personally worked with Steve Balmer and Kauai Leonard and Lawrence Frank. So just in your view, Mr. Elhoussin, what is the best argument that you've heard, you can imagine, for why aspiration would want to do this deal in the way that Steve Balmer has described it,

which is to say, without Steve Balmer or anyone from the Clippers, knowing or influencing the deal. deal in question. The best explanation I've received but Satorre was that this was a form of inception of planting the seed in the brain of Steve Balmer that these are

good guys to keep around because they take care of me and my people even if I'm not aware directly of how they are being taken care of. So if we're paying Quy Leonard and Quy Leonard remains a clipper and we're excited about our partnership with the Clippers, Steve Balmer will continue to funnel money into

our endeavor. That is the explanation that I've heard that I believe comes closest to sanity comes closest. Does not quite arrive, though. So Andre Charny, the aspiration CEO who signed the deal, had also issued, in fairness to this argument, a statement on Twitter in which he claimed, quote, in the months of discussion among our executives before signing the sponsorship,

I don't remember conversations about the NBA salary cap, end quote. And if we're going to be as What's the word not? What's it? It's another word for naive. It's like a girl's name, man. What? Oh, man.

Leave this then. Polyannic? Polyana-ish. Okay. If we're to be as polyanish as the clippers want us to be, Nailed it. Dennis Wong, Steve Baum's partner, as well invest money. So we just keep the money investing in our company because they like us,

because we keep their star player happy. Right, except you don't know that they're keeping your star player happy. Well, they know he's happy. But they don't know who to give credit to for that. Okay, it's falling apart. You see, you see why it's hard to be polyanish in this case. But this is the thing that I'm like really just like circling as we, again, open this folder, which is just that aspiration never announced or even referenced

the existence of this deal to anyone, certainly not in public. and certainly not directly to Mr. Balmer, because that, of course, would be violative of the rules. There you go. We should also keep in mind that Steve Balmer admitted to ESPN that he and the Clippers did formally introduce Kauai to aspiration. He said, quote, The introduction got made,

and then they were off to the races on their own. And so I guess Mr. Alhaston the logical question with NB, did the Clippers ever inquire about the results of this very important meeting between their founding sponsor and their most important employee. Hey, how'd it go? And also, was that curiosity

maybe coming from a place of concern given how, of course, Mr. Leonard's designated representative, Uncle Dennis Robertson, had been presenting himself across the NBA in years previous, such that they sparked an investigation in 2019.

Well, first of all, I'd love it if you referred him as Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson. And so this is the point in the episode where I actually do want to very quickly read from an athletic feature last week about Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson and how he handled his nephew's 2019 free agency. Quote, had Leonard chosen to re-sign with Toronto, the Raptors could only offer $190 million over five years.

His other suitors were restricted to 141 million over four years. And quote. And I'm just going to do the math here. real quick for a second because 190 minus 141. That gets us to $49 million, a $49 million deficit that the Clippers could not make up on the books, according to the CBA, which then brings back to mind, I dare say, the $48 million deal, negotiations for which Aspiration CEO totally does not. remember having to do anything with the NBA salary cap

and its collective bargaining agreement and the regulations mandated therein. I had the great privilege on my own show called Basketball Luminati to interview the one and only Bruce Arthur of the Toronto Star. Yes. And he told us in great detail, the Toronto version of the Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson pitch, which started with things that were doable,

and quickly escalated to a place of great cap circumvention peril. Well, I want to get to the two prongs of what Bruce Arthur for the Toronto Star has reported that Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson was requesting, because the question that I have for basketball reporters to just fundamentally ask on Media Day and for also the high-powered lawyers to investigate on behalf of the NBA League office would be simple. It is, did Steve Balmer and Lawrence Frank really have zero idea about this $48 million deal that the founding sponsor struck

with the most important employee in their organization. I've been kicking around that very question. Well, Mr. Alhassen, that's why we're doing a part five. Oh, my God. And drop the intro music there. That's the cold open.

I want to keep drilling down here into the financial logic, the presumed self-interest of aspiration as we try to understand who else was in the room, what else is happening. Because the company aspiration, right? They, at some point,

surpass a $2 billion valuation. And part of the whole logic here is that Aspiration wants to do this because it's good for the business of Aspiration. Kauai Leonard is happy. Kaui Leonard stays a clipper, according to the best steelman theory that you've offered. Therefore, Aspiration's business benefits. And so the thing that I want to interrogate here in this allegedly independently conceived relationship is what did the other executives at Aspiration think?

about what this would do to the business of aspiration. And so, Mr. Alhassen, please flip over the next piece of paper in your folder because this is a screenshot of a text exchange between two senior aspiration executives from December 21, 2021, that I have now confirmed to be authentic. And so I want you to be the sender on the right side of the screenshot. I will be the respondent. And the one note here before we do the table read is that the chief financial officer of aspiration, who chose to leave the sender,

company by September 2022, by the way, is a man named Roje Avanesian. And also, AIS, which will come up in this exchange, stands for Asperation Sustainable Impact Services. In other words, the complicated bunch of stuff had to do with carbon credits that Mr. Balmer was alluding to earlier. That was the focus of our last episode in this series. So, Rojee and I are trying to talk Joe and Andre out of a $48 million deal with Clippers player, Kauai Leonard. It's regional. Mail, niche redundant to the clippers, had no AIS impact, and is a huge expense

with no clear ROI. That's a horrible idea. Yeah, fuck. They are love drunk with these celebs. Plus, Quise dull. Yeah, we will go under-spending money

like that. Fast. Steph Curry is at least charismatic, if you want an NBA star, it's insane. sane. Which is a good point. By the way, as raised by that

varyingly golden age of radio voice that was reading those texts. Thank you, Mr. Torrey. Very good. I am told again, by the way, that Aspiration's chief marketing officer literally did not know who Kauai Leonard was. $48 million in a marketing deal,

and everyone's like, can we get staff? Why are we getting the dull guy? The sentence that I really think hits home as we explore, how could this be positive for aspiration as it's referring to a $48 million deal with Quiet Leonard, regional, male niche, redundant to the clippers, had no ACE impact. Meaning, we are investing in someone who does not reverberate much outside of Southern California, does not cross over to different demographics other than I'm presuming males age 18 to 15, 55, even within Southern California, does not resonate beyond Clippers fandom. Well, I'll just remind you, this text is sent December 2021.

What was the status of Kauai Leonard at that time in the 21-22 NBA season? Under contract and injured. He wasn't playing. Yes. So the whole question of, we need to boost the value of this company by getting this guy on the team, the dude wasn't playing. ruptured ACL missed the entirety of the season. Mind you, this was months after signing a lucrative extension. So the two frogs bring us now to a text message I introduced to the public record in our last episode.

It's a text message that was sent by a number associated with Kwai's uncle, Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson, his designated representative on the $28 million endorsement deal. And it was sent to Aspiration co-founder Joe Sandberg in February 2022, Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson. And lawyers for Joe Sandberg, for the record, have not replied to our detailed questions, including about this text. But Mr. Alhassen, could you please just read what that text message said? Good morning, Joe. Hope you had a wonderful weekend. Just a heads up. Things are still dragging. Mike has the contact for about 14 days now. Haven't heard back. Thanks. Just keeping you informed. And so you did say contact. It is contact. I believe it is meant to be contract, as I have also validated in my reporting. This was about, in fact, the $20 million equity offer, the second prong of the deal that Kauai Leonard wanted from the Raptors that we are now reporting. He was seeking from the Clippers as well. And the Mike, by the way, that Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson was referring to is a guy named Mike Shuckero, who was Aspirations chief legal officer. But the other thing I just need everybody to understand about the deal that Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson was apparently testing about, the second prong, this is new, okay? According to sources directly familiar with the $20 million equity deal, Kauai, was granted.

This deal in which he would be paid $5 million a year over four years had something called a put option on it. Mr. Alhassen, do you know what a put option is? I know it very well. but in case I hadn't done my research, please explain to the people what a put option is. I think I have someone who could help us out on that. So source number one, if you could help me out as a former member of Aspirations Finance Department,

what is a put option? To oversimplify, a put option is a fixed price at which a buyer is able to sell their stock in a company. So say they bought a put option at $5, and that stock essentially drops to a dollar. They have the right, but they're not obligated to sell that stock at the higher price, which is $5. And they have that put for a certain length of time. So let's put it in more concrete, hypothetical terms. let's say

Kauai Leonard acquires $20 million in equity from Joe Sandberg and Joe Sandberg puts a put put option at $20 million

on that $20 million in equity Kauai Leonard has just acquired from him. In other words, if Kauai Leonard exercises that put option, he is guaranteed

to get $20 million. Yes, that's how that would work. It is assuring Kauai Leonard that no matter what, even if aspiration goes into the shudder, you're getting $20 million guaranteed by Joe Sandberg. Correct. That's a pretty good deal now that you spell it out like that. It's the dream, like I said.

It's getting a little hot in here. Yeah, I might want to undo that top button. Because just to translate this as if I am five years old. If aspiration stock declined, dropping this deal's value below $20 million, Kauai Leonard was assured the legal right to sell its equity back for $20 million. It's like investing in something with no downside, because if it doesn't work, you get your money back, but if it does work, you get to reap the benefits.

Mr. Alhassen, you have just discovered what a put option fundamentally is. It is a way to mitigate downside risk. It is a way to ensure that no matter what, the worst case scenario is not going to be less than the price that you were told you would get. Hardly the vote of confidence, though. Look, I'm just saying, hypothetically, in this scenario, Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson and Kauai Leonard, they're not rookies when it comes to getting paid. They have questions. Is this a theoretical $20 million, or is this a real $20 million?

And according to the reporting that I've done, they wanted the real kind. And so the next document in your folder, Mr. Elhassen, explains how it is that Joe Sandberg was able to make this part of Kauai's deal happen over the protests, by the way, of those fellow executives who saw what this was. And they were like, we can't fucking do this. These are the people who are dragging their feet in the process of talks with Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson. And so Joe Sandberg said, you know what, I'm going to personally grant. that guaranteed $20 million myself. And he did it through one of his 12, he has 12 personal LLCs, and it was not AGO partners, as previously reported.

It was another one of them, in effect. An LLC, which Joe Sandberg called what, Mr. Elhoussin? RJB Partners, LLC. You are holding in your hands the statement of information as registered with California's Secretary of State from RJB Partners. And I knew to find this because Sandberg refers to RJB partners in an email which he sent to his personal attorneys with other aspiration executives cede,

and that is the next piece of paper in your folder. If you can please read what this document says. For avoidance of doubt, any and all benefit to aspiration from the Kwai deal is being subsidized by my contributing my equity to make this happen. In conjunction with my offering to do that, I also explained verbally to Andre that Quai's team wanted his legal fees paid. I'll state it here for you. I, via RJB, am transferring $20 million in old caps of stock to Quai over four years to enable this partnership for aspiration. The benefits that you, Mike, that Andre, that Roje will get from this partnership are subsidized by my, in-caps.

$20 million of stock. Regards, Joe. And this reminds me, Mr. Alhassen, of another conversation I had with source number one back in part one of this series. It does seem very clear that the people inside of Aspiration loved to email each other.

Yeah, that's a stupid fucking idiots. Quite frankly. Yeah, let's put it in writing. Great idea. To be fair, Mr. Torrey, as it continues to get a little hotter in here, Steve Balmer, Dennis Wong, Lawrence Frank can all say, well, that has nothing to do with us. Mm-hmm. Oh, yeah, that this could all be done independently, according to the foregoing theory that has been presented.

And so this is where I just want to begin to pull on a thread here. A thread of something that Joe Sandberg, in that email that you just read, had mentioned. Because he mentioned, quote, a benefit to aspiration. And the quote benefits that Mike, that Andre, that Roge, the rest of the C-suite, in other words, will get from this partnership, which again, he is personally subsidizing

with his $20 million for Kauai Leonard. And what nine aspiration sources now tell me is that to aspiration, the benefit was not simply keeping Kauai Leonard a Los Angeles Clipper because Aspiration wanted this team that they were already sponsoring to do well. That actually was the benefit to Steve Balmer and the Clippers,

that their player would be very happy. The benefit to aspiration was actually rational in its logic, in its financial thinking, because the benefit to aspiration, according to my reporting and these nine sources, is what the company got from Steve Balmer in exchange. The giant founding sponsorship deal. the signage all around the Clippers Arena,

the jersey patch on the bodies of the clippers themselves, the sign on the back of the court side seats. It was Steve Balmer vouching for Joe and Andre, the co-founders, with other investors, helping to arrange meetings over email and in person as an internal email sent by Mr. Sandberg in October 2021 to Charney and another aspiration executive confirms. As, by the way,

our old friend David Sampson read for us in part one of this fucking investigation. Bomber himself is enthusiastic to help and will personally be a reference and advocate where we ask him. So please keep that front of mind. And then, I mean, if you will, there is an email on November 1st, 2021 from Steve Bomber,

personally connecting the CEO of Intuit with Andre and Joe. Since Intuit and Aspiration already have a business relationship and all of us share a passion for the clips and our Intuit Dome project, I thought it might be fun for the four of us to take in a game together sometime soon. Pablo, it strikes me that if the names Sandberg and Charney were different,

if Aspiration had a different name, we would call this sports washing. We might, Mr. Alhassen. We might detect that they would want to use the imprimatur, be cosine, the representation, of a very respected rich motherfucker. And that would help them make their business real. The part I want to get to next

is the part where he said something that you kind of, I think, raised an eyebrow at as you were reading it. Because this part was, quote, I also explained verbally to Andre that Kauai's team wanted his legal fees paid. End quote. We've been focusing a lot on Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson in our investigation so far. Of course, he was the designated representative on the $28 million no-show endorsement deal that I obtained a copy of. He's also the guy whom my original source in the finance department, source number one, had told me,

had been calling aspiration when they were late on those quarterly $1.75 million payments to Mr. Leonard. But Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson, for those who are not familiar with the saga, he was also the protagonist, right, of the 2019 and investigation by the NBA into the prior caps or convention claims levied against Steve Ballmer's Clippers because even though the NBA did not find evidence of caps or convention back then, what did the NBA do, Mr. Alhassen? They instituted what might affectionately be called the Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson rule, which is only certified personnel may negotiate on behalf of a player for compensation, aka an actual agent, not a family member, not. an uncle. Yes, and there were, in fact, increased fines and penalties for teams that dared to not do that.

And the question, then, is who is the certified agent representing Kauai Leonard this whole time? It's a gentleman by the name of Mitch Frankel. Mr. Mitch Frankel, not Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson. Used to be an NFL agent, actually, before trying to build this whole agency around Kauai Leonard, his biggest client by far. Mitch Frankl came to represent Kauai during that time when Kauai was with the San Antonio Spurs, of course. And in fact, we found a photo of Mitch Frankl standing right next to Kauai Leonard. Kauai has his arm, his left arm around him. This is after they won the 2014 title.

And what is Mr. Mitch Frankl holding in this photograph, Mr. Alhassen? I believe that is what it is now known as the Bill Russell Finals MVP trophy. That's correct. Mr. Leonard is holding the Larry O'Brien. Mr. Frankel is holding the finals MVP trophy. And so in this way, I would like to lead you to the next piece of paper in your folder. Because the second name listed under the legal notices section of that $28 million no-show endorsement deal after Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson in Section in Section 4.1A as you take off your jacket. It's hot.

I know, it's getting real sweaty in here. What is that name there? These legal notices were sent. with a mandatory copy to Mitchell Frankel of Boca Raton, Florida. Which means that any legal notice that Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson received at his South Florida address, Mr. Mitchell Frankel, Kauai's actual agent, would also receive at his South Florida address, which takes us now to the next sheet of paper in your folder. Because this happens to be a series of text messages sent from Mr. Mitch Frankel to Mike Shuckero,

the aforementioned General Counsel of Aspiration, who provided these to me on the record after I requested any and all documentation of any communications that Mr. Shokuro had with Kauai's agent that were not protected by attorney-client privilege. And so just to set the scene, this is all about Kauai Leonard's second-ever payment

of $1.75 million that was due from aspiration at the end of September 22, but of course, September 22 came and went, October 22 came and went, and that takes us to, when this text message was sent, please play the role of Mr. Frankel. I will be the General Council of Aspiration,

and you can timestamp us as we go. November 2nd, 22, 844 a.m. Mike, good morning. Can you tell me the status of the payment from Aspiration to KL2? Thank you, Mitch Frankel. 10.22 a.m. I have a call into our finance team.

They are West Coast, so still early. I'll be back. Thank you. November 3rd, 2022 at 109 p.m. Any update? Thank you. Yes. I'll send via email. Sorry. Morning got away from me. November 3rd, 22 at 5.30 p.m. I never received an email. My address is at gmail.com. Thanks. All lowercase. Sending now, period.

November 3rd, 2022 at 6.43 p.m. Thank you. All of which is to say, Mr. Elhassen, that this scheme, as it has been reported and alleged, was not merely Mr. Uncle Dennis Robertson going rogue. This was something that Kauai's camp, his actual licensed registered certified agent, alongside aspiration, clearly considered pretty important. And I should just say, here that we did reach out to Mitch Frankel and his office, again, with a detailed list of questions and an interview request to which he did not respond. But for the record, Mike Chakarrel, the General Counsel for Asperation, has told me that he would make those texts available to the NBA,

to the Clippers, to Wachtel Lipton, the law firm that the NBA hired this month to investigate this alleged salary capture convention scheme. All that is available to them, I am told. But yeah, man. It's not a bum. It's not a bunch of money. It's a feature. It seems like this was a thing that everybody knew needed to be paid and as of November 22

wasn't. This wasn't an alley in which Mr. Uncle Daniels. Robertson was standing with a trench coat. This was a whole plan. This was the lobby of Quy Leonard Inc.

in essence. And the question then is inside the Clippers building. What did they think about this arrangement? And this past week, I will say, I checked in with a former Clippers official. And they said they really do like Steve Palmer personally, still, by the way. But this is the quote they gave me.

The world in Clipperland revolves around Kauai Leonard. And the moon is Dennis Robertson. There is no way the Clippers did not know about this deal, end quote. And they pointed, straight to Steve Balmer and the president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank the innermost circle

who handled the most sensitive issues around one of the most delicate superstars that anyone has managed in professional sports. I'll tell you a story and I believe the statute of limitations has run out so none of the people here can be punished for this but when I was working for the Phoenix Suns

in the lead up to the 2007 offseason we had a whiteboard where we would write our projected starting lineups and all these different permutations if you remember at the time we were in talks

to acquire Kevin Garnett we're trying to acquire Kevin Garnett so there was a version where Kevin Garnett was our starting center it's a version where our start of mine's our starting center all these different lineups, different permutations what if we get this guy, what if we swing the trade

for that guy, maybe our first round pick Here will be that slot. But in every permutation, the starting small forward was Grant Hill. Hmm. And I remember asking, how can we be sure that he's going to sign with us? He was going to be a free agent that summer, but how do we know he's going to sign with us? And everybody laughed. And July 2007 came around, and we signed Grant Hill.

I don't know. At that time, I was very, very, very low on the totem pole, I believe. I might have been a basketball operations assistant. But I say it to say that there are what sometimes can be classified as open secrets, meaning we all know, you may not know all the details, but you know what's going to happen. Now, obviously, that's a much smaller scale than what we're talking about here. But it would not surprise me that, A, of course, the president of basketball operations is involved. He's the architect building the team.

if we're committing to something of that nature, of that large of a commitment, then obviously he's included. But the other person I would assume would be included in that conversation very, very intimately, would be the head coach of the team. And this is where I should probably point out that Tai Liu, the head coach of the Clifters,

at the time and today, will be speaking at Media Day. And I'll be curious if anybody wants to ask him the question you have suggested, logically, might deserve asking. But now I want to just swing the camera back because the finance team came up in that conversation between the General Council of Aspiration

and Mitch Frankel, the agent of Kauai Leonard. And so this is where I think it's really worth pointing out that there's another benefit that Joe Sandberg didn't necessarily spell out directly to his C-suite at the inception of the Kauai-Lennard arrangement. Because this benefit, again, I would argue is simple. If Steve Balmer wanted Kauai Leonard to get paid on the side,

and as Steve Balmer wanted that payment to be completely secret at risk of NBA punishment, he needed aspiration to have enough money to pay Kauai Leonard, which would then logically explain why Steve Balmer kept putting in money into this collapsing company. But the windfall, undeniably, seems to me, an enormous benefit to aspiration. In fact, the biggest benefit that Joe Sandberg might have been alluding to is that you have a source of not merely credibility, but a whole lot of money that you could tap into when needed.

Straight cash, homie. That's what we call that. But Pablo, when do the Clippers stop giving them money? So the timeline here, right? Kauai wasn't getting paid in September, October, November of 2022. That's where we are now in the timeline. Right. And the reason I think it's possible that Steve Ballmer and the Clippers stopped putting money in at that period was because perhaps they were learning what was happening.

They might have detected the fact pattern we are reverse engineering now. I mean, as the Clippers themselves admitted to us, quote, we made payments to aspiration until the company was unable to fulfill their responsibilities, end quote. Which would then explain why both Uncle Dennis and Mitch Frankel would be calling and texting about. Kauai's money. But on December 6th, 2022, to remind everybody, what happens? Who finally comes through to save aspiration? Because it wasn't Uncle Dennis. It was Mr. Grandpa Dennis Wong.

The person who saved the day was Dennis Wong, according to multiple sources and bank statements and cash forecasts that we reviewed. Steve Bomber's college roommate, the only minority owner of the clip. he trusted to own a piece of the team who on December 6th, 2022 invested $1.99 million, having never invested in aspiration before. Dude signs off on a purchase agreement that tells him that the company is in default, that its independent auditor had resigned, that the SEC and FINRA are probing the company, that they're facing seven-figure litigation, and Mr. Dennis Wong, a different Dennis,

who did not respond to our request for comment, invests anyway. And nine days later, on December 15th, while the company cannot make payroll. On the same day, aspiration lays off 20% of their staff. Kauai Leonard gets paid $1.75 million. Grandpa Dennis said, never tell me the odds. He turned in a Han Solo right there. He put in just enough money at a time and in a quantity that was inexplicable to anyone who's ever reviewed the fact pattern we have established. I await also the appropriation. The appropriate spin on that. Let me go off script here a little bit.

Mr. Tori, let's assume right now you and I have an interdimensional portal that takes us straight to Clippers Media Day. We're credentialed. The mic has been passed around. Quire Leonard is on the podium. Yes, in the front. Kauai, why didn't you

do anything to promote aspiration despite signing a $28 million endorsement contract with aspiration? Um, they didn't ask me to do anything. Did you ever exercise a put option that would have guaranteed the $20 million in equity that you were granted by Aspiration co-founder Joe Sandberg? I don't know what that is. Did you know that your agent and uncle were pressuring aspiration to make its overdue sponsorship payments to you? I'm not familiar. I just go out and play basketball for the Clippers.

Were you aware that the owners of the Clippers were investing in that? same company while you were awaiting payment from that same company. Again, I have no idea what happens. I just go out there and I play basketball. Have you seen the video of the last time that your boss, Steve Balmer, spoke at Media Day? Because it was 2021 and he sat on stage right next to the guy who co-founded the company that was paying you $1.75 million late. I'm usually pretty busy on Media Day. I don't get to see what everyone else is doing.

Well, check this out. The Pieste de Resistence as we went through this is when we had a chance to really sit down and meet the folks from aspiration. I'm pretty keen on all the projects and we're keen to have these guys as a marketing partner. I don't think there's much conflict between what we're doing.

on the basketball side in the short term and what we're trying to do with Intuit Don't in parallel. And there's no financial tie. We're going to invest in our team, whatever we need to, to put ourselves in a position to win. And we try to get guys signed up to a long term, longer term deals, which I think we did well this offseason, Lawrence Frank and his team. But at the same time, so we're going to invest to win and we're going to invest in the

building. Okay. What does that really mean? I don't know. Oh, that aspiration. I think at this point in the story, the thing we got to do is really get into Steve Balmer's relationship

with the guy sitting next to him on that stage, Joe Sandberg. So with that, let me turn things over to Joe Sandberg. And I'll give you one guess as to when we're going to do it. Before the break. If only. So if you have listened, And, I mean, and you're increasingly sweaty. This got hot.

Yeah, get comfortable. We're almost there. If you listen to the two public interviews that Steve Balmer has given since we broke this story, this was with ESPN and then with Sports Business Journal, he, in fact, is a victim. This is not a fun thing to be through. I was personally defrauded.

Remember, they defrauded me. They defrauded many other investors. These were guys who committed fraud. How would I be able to... Look, they conned me. You're one of the richest men in America. They con me. I made an investment in these guys thinking it was on the up and up, and they conned me.

Steve Bomber has been trying to say very clearly that he is a victim of Aspiration co-founder Joe Sandberg, who has now played guilty to wire fraud, that he is a victim as well of Sandberg's alleged co-conspirator, Aspiration Board member Ibrahim al-Husani, who got arrested in October 24 and has since pleaded guilty to wire fraud, acknowledging the falsification of financial documents at Joe Sandberg's direction. On Media Day. I suspect you are also, again, going to hear a party line about victimization and fraud and being conned quite a bit. There are a lot of layers to all of this, and the Clippers and Steve Bomber, they have denied vehemently any wrongdoing in all of this.

I know Steve Balmer and I think he's a great guy and he says he didn't do that. I believe him. I give him props for acknowledging that, for owning up to that, for saying that, for saying that he got duped and what have you. And I do believe it warrants an investigation because of Pablo Tori finds out podcasts and stuff. How could you invest 50 million? The answer is he invested 50 million because it's nothing to him. And he kind of liked it. And you might say, how could you not do your due diligence?

Because it's literally nothing to him. It's like, did you do your due diligence on the Mexican restaurant? where you had dinner tonight? Did you read the Yelp reviews? And that sentiment, to be maximally clear, has been echoed very explicitly, I mean, in the statements provided to us as a show by the Clippers. Quote, neither Mr. Balmer nor the Clippers

circumvented the salary cap or engaged in any misconduct related to aspiration. Any contrary assertion is provably false. The team ended its relationship with aspiration years ago during the 2022-23 season when aspiration defaulted on its obligations. Neither the Clippers nor Mr. Balmer was aware of any improper activity by aspiration or its co-founder until after the government instituted its investigation. The team and Mr. Balmer stand ready to assist law enforcement in any way they can.

So the question then becomes, when did the government start its investigation? That's an important time peg here, given what the clippers are saying to us. And the crucial question I've been following this whole time, therefore, is when does it become implausible for a billionaire defrauded by Joe Sandberg in the way that we have heard to continue to give money to Joe Sandberg? And we pointed already to Dennis Wong, Falmer's most intimate Clippers proxy, putting in $1.99 million in December 22 while the company was in default and so forth and so on, which to me, frankly, I mean, is enough. That feels like the de facto smoking gun right there. The alternate governor of the clipper is becoming the only new investor in that round of fundraising and an amount that made zero sense otherwise.

But then you add in what we reported the last episode, which is that in March of 23, after Joe Sandberg sought investment from at least 19 other investment firms for that round, in this span of the fall of 22 to the spring of 23, all 19 of those investment firms, which are listed in court documents that I obtained, said no. And yet, Steve Balmer personally decided to invest another $10 million into this completely f***ed company. At $23 a share,

days after a Forbes article came out titled A Floundering Fintex Risky Reboot. You may be thinking to yourself, I mean, well, maybe Steve Bomber doesn't care about Forbes. Well, please slip over the next piece of paper because this is an article in Forbes from later that same month. Please show it to the camera.

I can't even read this. I know there's an audio audience. What is it? What do you see? It is the cover of Forbes, an extreme close-up of Steve Balmer's smiling face. It's a pleasant, slight smile. Yeah. Says LA Clippers owner, Steve Balmer,

the title, Welcome to the Balmer Dome. His new $2 billion arena raises the game in the NBA and then the article, the cover story itself. It is the daily cover, online only for the record,

but nonetheless, big Forbes over his forehead. For Steve Balmer, building an NBA champion is harder than running Microsoft, but more fun. Maybe, maybe whatever. What if he's only just

scrolling through Twitter? Maybe he's not even seeing that stuff. The next piece of paper, could you read the tweet that Forbes sent to promote the article? Just so we have it in the public record. This is from at Forbes with the gold check bar. Former Microsoft CEO Steve Balmer has been trying to spend his way to an NBA championship from the start.

The problem, of course, is that if money could buy championships, the fingers of both Balmer's hands would be weighted down with rings. March 26, 2023. Yeah. So, again, in the master timeline here, weeks after those articles and Balmer's $10 million investment, I am told, The federal government began its process of interviewing dozens of aspiration employees, two of whom are the sources you've been hearing on tape throughout our series here.

The federal investigation, at this point, was underway. And by January of 24, as your tie is now off your deck. This is a lot of stuff. We're not done. January 24, Bloomberg publishes this headline with a giant photo of the Intuit Dome across the top. Clippers Arena deal dragged into U.S. probe of California FinTech.

And Bloomberg, by the way, also in that article, got a statement from the Clippers. This is dated January 18, 2024. The Clippers said in a statement that, quote, the sponsorship agreement entered into between Aspiration

and the L.A. Clippers was terminated by the team last season. This, in no way, relieves aspiration from the obligations they are under contract to provide. So I'll just remind everybody here that the Clippers, having terminated their sponsorship agreement with Aspiration during the 22-23 season, is very interesting phrasing.

Now, when you remember that Steve Bomber invested another $10 million to the benefit of aspiration in March 23, there happened to be 14 regular season games left in the season, meaning he did the opposite. He went back in. And by the way, so did Bloomberg, because the coverage proceeds. there was another Bloomberg article in July of 24. July 10, 2024. DiCaprio-backed green finance startup unraveled on dubious deals. Three years after pursuing a $2 billion IPO,

aspiration partners faces probes by U.S. authorities. Look, you get the gist, which is that by early 2024, it was beyond obvious using even just the Clipper's own statements that the government was all over this. and Mr. Balmer, of course, had become aware of improper activity by aspiration or its co-founder Joe Sandberg, at least by that. And all of this reminded me of a particularly thoughtful interview that I once saw Steve Balmer do with 60 minutes. 60 minutes in October 24 had profiled him.

Well after the government had started its investigation into aspiration. He bought the basketball team, which is certainly an extravagance, but he's also giving away billions through a philanthropy he runs with his wife, Connie. It really is kind of grant by grant. You can't look back and say, well, people's economic mobility this year was a two, and next year it's going to be a 2.3. We can't do population level measurement. But place by place, you know, grant by grant, we can do that.

So the Balmer Group is an entity that I want to introduce everybody to. The Balmer Group is Steve Balmer's philanthropic arm. His organization that he runs with his wife, Connie, who was sitting right there next to him in that interview, and as you heard them say, thoughtfully, they care about their donations. They go through them grant by grant, as they said. So what I did was go through their donations grant by grant.

I went through their database. The Balmer Group has a website. And in the Our Grant section of the website, you just notice immediately. there are donations ranging from $500,000 to $424 million. It's vast and impressive. But what caught my eye as I was scanning these dollar amounts was a $1.875 million grant.

Don't say it, please. And it was made to an organization that is listed on the next piece of paper in your folder. $1.875 million just seems a little... Oh, God. I've come full circle. On the first day, I was like, oh, I can't wait to see what's under these papers. I don't even want to see this anymore.

What is the organization called, Mr. Elhassen? Golden State Opportunity Foundation. Golden State Opportunity is dedicated to ending poverty by providing all Californians with the tools to build financial well-being. Our grant supports its outreach to more than one million low-income Angelinos, helping them to claim hundreds of millions of dollars

from tax credits and improve their financial situations. And so what I went to go do was learn more about the Golden State Opportunity Foundation. But when I went to the Where We Started section of the Golden State Opportunity Foundation's website, this is what I saw. Not found. Sorry that page was not found. Which was weird. It's weird, right? And so what I did was I went to the trusty old internet.

Internet Archive, a journalist's best friend. Wayback machine. The wayback machine. And this, Amin, is what a cached version of the page used to read as recently as November 2024. Jesus Christ. Oh, my God. Oh, hold on.

Golden State Opportunity founder, Joseph Sandberg, grew up in circumstances familiar to many Californians. by a single mom who struggled to make ends meet on her public school teacher salary, Joe's family lost their home to foreclosure after falling deeply into debt. And it goes on. And it is a tremendous story. In case anyone was wondering, maybe it's another Joseph Stamberg. That's the picture on the page that was erased.

Folks, I had a whole thing. I was going to do the Southern lawyer action. I was going to push back. Now you've just dropped. We're just talking in our actual voices now. Completely broken character. None other than disgraced aspiration, founder Joe Sandberg is in fact the founder of the Golden State Opportunity Foundation.

This is his charity. It's his baby. And it's a fact that is verified, by the way, by the organization's Form 990 IRS filings, which also list him as the longtime board chair. You can find references to Joe Sanberg's role in this organization all over his Wikipedia page, easily Googledable articles, interviews about his ambitions in Democratic politics. And so the relevant question, I mean, I suppose would be this.

when did the Balmer Group decide to give yet another seven-figure infusion of cash to an entity founded by Joe Sandberg? The answer to that question, as you can establish here in this paperwork, is that the Balmer Group announced this grant as part of a larger roundup of grants

in December of 2024. It's hot as it. I'm just saying, is anyone else? December 24 was a month after the last recorded mention of Joe Sandberg on the charity's website, which we showed you. It was a couple of months after the arrest of Joe Sandberg's co-conspirator Ibrahim al-Husani by the FBI. It was almost a year after Bloomberg publicly broke the story of the government's investigation and aspiration. It was more than a year after the clippers claimed to end their partnership with aspiration and dozens of aspiration employees had been

interviewed by the federal government. In other words, well beyond the point when St. Steve Balmer would have learned that he was humiliated and defrauded and victimized by Joe Sandberg, as he keeps on saying, Steve Balmer's charity, the Balmer Group, appears to have donated around December 2024, according to the public records of his own internal database, $1.875 million to that same fraudster for the first time. Golden State Opportunity, what is it? 10th anniversary. There is this.

10th anniversary. They've been around for a long time, Pablo. A long time. They've been doing good work, right? And also the bomber group, you said they've given out $400 million. He doesn't know. It's like loose change in his couch cushions.

We gave it something called the Golden Tate Foundation. Gozade opportunity. Sounds great. It's true. It's true that $1.875 million was approximately doing the math here, worth 0.0014% of Steve Balmer's estimated net worth at the time. And so, in fairness, we put this in front of the Clippers and the Balmer Group and the Golden State Opportunity Foundation. I wanted to know what this $1.875 million was used for.

And why it was $1.875 million? And what I can tell you here is that right away, once we brought up the question of whether Steve Balmer made charitable donations associated with Joe Sandberg, the chief communications officer of the Clippers acknowledged that the issues we raised, quote, are germane to the investigation by the NBA, and we will let them conduct their investigation. End quote. But then, once we asked that Chief Communications Officer of the Clippers, specifically about this 2024 donation that Ballmer Group made to Golden State Opportunity, he took some time

to send us a statement. on behalf of Balmer Group philanthropy, which felt conspicuous, in which the Clippers chief comms officer volunteered on behalf of Balmer Group philanthropy that Balmer Group had actually sent four grants to Golden State Opportunity, dating back to 2018, which Golden State Opportunity, in turn, acknowledged receiving. But when I then proceeded to line up all the dates provided to us here, I noticed something. I noticed that in an email, Golden State Opportunity President Amy Everett told us that

Balmer Group's initial grant, which started on January 1st, 2018, was coordinated by her, quote, predecessor. But according to tax filings, Amy Everett was the first person Joe Sandberg ever gave that title to, other than himself. Everett also told us that Sanford. Remainned the chairman of his charities board up until March 4th, 2025, which happens to be the day after Joe Sandberg got arrested following roughly two years of federal investigation. And so, when it comes to what is germane to the NBA investigation, the known connection between Joe Sandberg and Steve Balmer now dates back to almost four years before their names ever appeared together through Asper. all the way back to 2017, when discussions for Balmer Group's initial donation began.

All of this, I think, deepens what the decision to make a new, ongoing donation from Balmer Group, starting in November 2024, to help with tax support for low-income workers. They got granted amid that ongoing federal investigation into the chairman of this charity's board might actually mean. But look, maybe, I mean, this foundation has done and continues to do good work. But the timing of this donation is something that just to me would defy, what's that phrase again about explanation? Cannot rationally be explained. That's right. As source number one from the finance department at aspiration also points out, Am I taking crazy pills?

It's just inconceivable to me to be both hoodwinked and bamboozled, but yet continuously giving money to Joe Sandberg. I don't know how to make that make sense in my mind. Well, I want to anticipate the possibility that Steve Balmer really believed in the mission of the Golden State Opportunity Foundation. Joe Sandberg's baby, the thing that he was the head of. And so maybe there is an art versus the artist's sort of distinction he's drawing. No, it does not make any iota of sense to invest in 2021,

contribute nearly 100 million in carbon offset prepurchases, reinvest in 2022 or or 23 around claim all of that to be lost in 2023 and then come back for more in 2024 have you a charitable donation

maybe Steve Balmer's a secret masochist that is honestly one of the most persuasive theories that anyone has offered at this point in the reporting yeah Steve Balmer's kink is being robbed.

Rob me blind, daddy. Mr. Alhassen, the table is strewn with papers. Your clothes have come off. You are as sweaty as I am now, as I contemplate, exactly where this story goes next.

But what did you find out today? I find out that in a different world, in a different timeline, you would be part of Scooby-Doo's mystery team. And Steve Ballmer would be wearing a mask and we'd pull the mask off. And as he's bound and tied and sitting on the ground, he'd look up at you angrily. And he'd say, and I would have gotten away with it. If it weren't for you, you meddling kids and that mutt over there with the glasses on. Zoinks! Quote, the only cartoon that makes sense anymore.

Rumble. Come on, man. 1.875, pick a different number. Pick a different charity. Says anything. Find a new person. Hey, sorry, we're not going to be able to make that payment anymore. Scoob!

Jesus. Jinkies. This has been Pablo Torre finds out. A Metal Arc Media production. and I'll talk to you next time.