Mike Vorkunov, reporting for The Athletic (gift link):

The NBA levied the largest punishment in league history on the LA
Clippers and owner Steve Ballmer on Wednesday after a year-long
investigation determined that they circumvented the league’s
salary cap rules to help funnel millions to Kawhi Leonard. The
Clippers will lose five first-round picks — selections in 2029,
2030, 2031, 2032 and 2033 — and are being fined $30 million, the
league announced.

Ballmer has been suspended for one year, the NBA said, “for
knowingly seeking to help Mr. Leonard obtain off-court income
opportunities.” The NBA said Ballmer approved a Clippers deal with
Aspiration because he knew it was a precondition for the company
to enter into a sponsorship deal with Leonard.

The Clippers, according to NBA investigators, tried to evade NBA
rules on circumvention by creating a “novel theory” that it was OK
to introduce business partners to players if the player or their
representative asked for introductions. The NBA did not find that
persuasive.

Basically Steve Ballmer invested over $50 million in a now-bankrupt startup named Aspiration. Aspiration was the jersey-patch sponsor for the Clippers, and after Leonard signed with the Clippers, Aspiration signed Leonard to a $28 million no-show “endorsement” deal. Leonard asked for, and then received, more money than his on-the-books salary.

It’s a classic Microsoft dirty-tricks move to circumvent the NBA’s player salary cap. There’s nothing illegal about what Ballmer and the Clippers did. They violated league rules, not the law. The difference is that the NBA is a league with a strong commissioner’s office that can investigate cheating and impose serious penalties. If tech companies were teams in a similar league, Microsoft would have been fined dozens of times throughout the ’80s and ’90s and ’00s. Ballmer would have been suspended multiple times and Bill Gates would have been suspended so many times he probably would have been kicked out of the league. If there was anything underhanded Microsoft could do to get ahead — or to stick the knife in a competitor — they did it.

That worked out fabulously well for Microsoft. It doesn’t work in the NBA. The Clippers remain a loser franchise that not only has never won a title, but has never even appeared in the Finals. Losing a first-round draft pick each year from 2029–2033 (inclusive) certainly won’t help get them off the schneid.