Kawahi Leonard offered a free multi-million dollar penthouse if he stays

[Fafnir]

Isn't this a form of bribery lol

Kind of?

You could look at is as just additional compensation for his job, but given that his job explicitly forbids such payments as circumvention of the CBA I think bribe is an accurate descriptor.

[Moranis]

How is this different than any endorsement deal?  Have Kawahi do a commercial or appearance for the company and receive condo as payment if nothing else.   

Receiving more than fair market value for an endorsement is considered circumvention.

This guy isn't associated with the team in any way though, correct?  He is just a private citizen that wants Kawhi to stay in town and he is getting so much publicity for his business by even putting it out there, he probably owes Kawhi 2 condos.

[footey]

I hope Kawhi stays with the Raptors.  I know he's a headache for us, but he's made the East more legitimate.  Plus he is super fun to watch play.

Balance of really good teams throughout the league is good for league health, and makes Celtic games more fun to watch.

Not to mention the Raptors took a big risk signing him.

[bopna]

Don't superstars get this sort of thing all the time anyways.. Its probably not reported much but these players do earn more from endorsements, commercials etc more than what they earn in their contract.

[bdm860]

A team hiring a player's relative or business partner as an employee.

Any outside compensation, investment, business opportunity or anything else of value furnished to the player or any other person or entity controlled by, related to, or acting on behalf of the player.

These rules definitely aren't enforced.

Here's a story about Porzingis's brother and how the Knicks had several friends/family on payroll:

Janis, who had a modest European playing career, wanted to be a bigger part of the Knicks’ team, too. According to sources, Janis asked for jobs for some members of Porzingis’ entourage. But nothing ever materialized.

It’s not uncommon for these type of jobs to be granted to a team’s superstar. When Carmelo Anthony was a Knick, Asani Swann was on the Knicks payroll with an official position, director of player relations. Swann was Anthony’s longtime branding manager and worked solely with Anthony.

Amare Stoudemire’s security man, Max Cayard, was named to the Knicks security staff soon after Stoudemire signed. When Anthony and Stoudemire moved on, so did Swann and Cayard.

Dwyane Wade has been gifted multiple cars by local Miami businesses while in Miami:  One in 2012, another in 2013.  These aren't measly Kia's or Hyundia's, we're talking over $500k in free cars here.


Also interesting that the Staples Center was the first (and only?) NBA arena to have a Blaze Pizza, of which LeBron is a famous early investor.  This was announced in Oct 2016, so a couple of years before he joined the Lakers, but if you're one of the people who believes these things are planned for years in advance, then it's not a stretch to see a grey area (though I admit this one is probably a stretch, especially for a growing business HQ'd in Cali, just interesting to try to connect the dots).

[Briantir]

I think he wanted to be a Spur for life but his team threw him under the bus and disrespected him in front of the media

really good chance he stays in Toronto or goes to LA I don't see any other option.

[Monkhouse]

A team hiring a player's relative or business partner as an employee.

Any outside compensation, investment, business opportunity or anything else of value furnished to the player or any other person or entity controlled by, related to, or acting on behalf of the player.

These rules definitely aren't enforced.

Here's a story about Porzingis's brother and how the Knicks had several friends/family on payroll:

Janis, who had a modest European playing career, wanted to be a bigger part of the Knicks’ team, too. According to sources, Janis asked for jobs for some members of Porzingis’ entourage. But nothing ever materialized.

It’s not uncommon for these type of jobs to be granted to a team’s superstar. When Carmelo Anthony was a Knick, Asani Swann was on the Knicks payroll with an official position, director of player relations. Swann was Anthony’s longtime branding manager and worked solely with Anthony.

Amare Stoudemire’s security man, Max Cayard, was named to the Knicks security staff soon after Stoudemire signed. When Anthony and Stoudemire moved on, so did Swann and Cayard.

Dwyane Wade has been gifted multiple cars by local Miami businesses while in Miami:  One in 2012, another in 2013.  These aren't measly Kia's or Hyundia's, we're talking over $500k in free cars here.


Also interesting that the Staples Center was the first (and only?) NBA arena to have a Blaze Pizza, of which LeBron is a famous early investor.  This was announced in Oct 2016, so a couple of years before he joined the Lakers, but if you're one of the people who believes these things are planned for years in advance, then it's not a stretch to see a grey area (though I admit this one is probably a stretch, especially for a growing business HQ'd in Cali, just interesting to try to connect the dots).

TP. I agree most of these business ventures rarely reported; which is why most players CPA's or financial advisors get audited.

[Fafnir]

I do agree that the rules aren't black and white. Family members and agents getting jobs and perks in organizations is something that happens across the league. I don't think the NBA cares about a few family members on the payroll (if their salary is reasonable) or endorsement deals. They're more concerned about LBJ (or someone in his orbit) getting an extra $50 million dollars (to go by one estimate of his true value in his prime) to go to the Knicks from Dolan related companies.

On the Wade example I would be surprised if those car's were appearance fees for Wade showing up at the dealership.  Which giving what famous people get for appearance fees and the nature of those business (car's at cost) probably aren't wildly off market value.

[Fafnir]

I think he wanted to be a Spur for life but his team threw him under the bus and disrespected him in front of the media

really good chance he stays in Toronto or goes to LA I don't see any other option.

Refusing to play for an entire year is a weird way to indicate you want to be a Spur for life.

[Ogaju]

Salary cap implications?

[bdm860]

I do agree that the rules aren't black and white. Family members and agents getting jobs and perks in organizations is something that happens across the league. I don't think the NBA cares about a few family members on the payroll (if their salary is reasonable) or endorsement deals. They're more concerned about LBJ (or someone in his orbit) getting an extra $50 million dollars (to go by one estimate of his true value in his prime) to go to the Knicks from Dolan related companies.

On the Wade example I would be surprised if those car's were appearance fees for Wade showing up at the dealership.  Which giving what famous people get for appearance fees and the nature of those business (car's at cost) probably aren't wildly off market value.

What makes the Kawhi thing interesting to me is how this really starts to cross the line.

With the friends/family on payroll, we're talking a few hundred thousand per year.  With Wade's free cars, still only <$300k per year.  (Personaly, I don't think it was an appearance fee, more of an attempt at advertising/publicity by the car dealership, of which $200k-$300k definitely seems like a fair price.)  And I'm sure this happens all the time with every team across the league (C's gifted Shaq a free RV, which they later denied was from them, wink, wink).  But in all these cases we're talking peanuts compared to NBA payroll, below minimum rookie salary.  Against the rules sure, but nobody cares.  Kind of like going 60mph in a 55.

But a luxury Toronto penthouse?  Now we're talking several million dollars in extra, well publicized comp.  Don't know if the actual unit in question has  been publicized, are we talking $2m or $10m?  (But that's CAD, so converting to USD it might only be worth $1.75m  )  Either way, it kind of starts to get out of that "everybody does it, no big deal, just sweep this under the rug" and more into the "we need to nip this in the bud before it becomes a serious problem, and the league is getting too much negative publicity over this."  This is closer to 75-80mph in a 55, might be time to step in and enforce the rules.

Will be interesting to see if the league steps in here or investigates if Kawhi actually re-signs and accepts. Seems more than fair market value for advertising/publicity compared to something like Wade's free cars.

[Fafnir]

TP, I definitely agree this sort of escalation is something the NBA would likely take a look at. The public nature of it most of all would make me think the Raptors or the league would intervene in some matter.

[greg683x]

all of us need to be rooting for him to resign in Toronto.   If he lives up to the rumors and bolts to LA then all it does is gives teams like the Lakers more power to try and pull the crap that they did this year with Anthony Davis

[Big333223]

Reminds me of Legal Seafood trying to get KD to come to Boston a few years ago.

https://www.bostonmagazine.com/restaurants/2016/06/09/legal-sea-foods-kevin-durant-boston/

[kraidstar]

Ultimately I don't think the league will care unless there is some connection between this company and the raptors.

You can bet LeBron and Shaq got under the table incentives to go to LA.