The 2026 NBA All-Star game is coming to the Clippers’ new home, the Intuit Dome, and the NBA’s ongoing investigation into possible salary cap circumvention by the team to get more money to Kawhi Leonard is not going to change that, NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said.
“There’s no contemplation of moving the All-Star Game,” Silver said Monday, while at the NBC Sports headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut, to discuss the network’s return to broadcasting NBA games (including the All-Star Game). “Planning for the All-Star Game and the surrounding activities are operating completely independently of the ongoing investigation.”
This shouldn’t be a surprise. The NBA’s All-Star Game is a massive production and undertaking that goes well beyond just the on-court games and showcases. Players and league sponsors plan events and parties, hotels and venues are booked, and fans plan trips to the host city around the All-Star events. To rip that up and move a game less than five months out would be an impossible task. The NBA did move the 2017 All-Star Game out of Charlotte in reaction to the “bathroom law” in North Carolina; however, it made that move in the previous summer (the league returned to Charlotte with the game two years later, in 2019).
The league is investigating an alleged “no-show” endorsement contract Leonard had with a Clippers sponsor, a company called Aspiration, that team owner Steve Ballmer had invested in multiple times. Aspiration also became a team sponsor and the Clippers bought environmental credits from the company — that was Aspiration’s “business” — for the Intuit Dome. The relationship between the Clippers and the sponsor fell apart in 2023 (although not before minority owner Dennis Wong made a $2 million investment in Aspiration, just before Leonard received one of his $1.75 million endorsement payments). Aspiration has since filed for bankruptcy, and its CEO pled guilty to defrauding investors.
At the heart of the allegations — first uncovered by the Pablo Torre Finds Out podcast — is that Leonard did no work or marketing for Aspiration yet got a $48 million endorsement deal ($20 million in now-worthless stock). People with Aspiration told the podcast that this deal was about circumventing the salary cap. Both Leonard and the Clippers have maintained their innocence, saying they were duped and defrauded like other investors, and that they welcome the league’s investigation.
There is no timeline for when that investigation will be complete, but it will not stop the All-Star Game from coming to the Intuit Dome.
Read the full article here