The Kawhi Leonard trade is done. Sort of. The Clippers and Raptors have an agreement in place sending Kawhi back to Toronto for Brandon Ingram, Gradey Dick, unprotected first-round picks in 2031 and 2033, a 2027 first-round pick swap, and second-round picks in 2030 and 2033. That is a haul.
Only problem: nobody can pull the trigger yet. The whole deal is sitting in limbo while the NBA finishes its investigation into whether the Clippers funneled money to Kawhi through Aspiration, the now-defunct financial services company that had him under a suspicious no-services endorsement deal starting in 2022.
Pablo Torre broke the story earlier this year and it has snowballed. Aspiration co-founder Joe Sanberg is already serving 14 years in prison after a separate fraud conviction. The Clippers deny they routed cap-circumvention money through Aspiration and claim they were themselves defrauded. Adam Silver has to decide whether he buys that.
Here is where it gets sticky for Toronto. If the league drops the hammer on the Clippers with heavy draft-pick forfeitures or voids Kawhi’s contract, the value of what the Raptors are giving up shifts. Nobody wants to send two unprotected firsts across the border and then find out the guy they traded for is playing on a renegotiated deal because of an investigation they had no part in.
Kawhi wants the trade done. Multiple reports say he has strong feelings about getting back to Toronto, where he won a title in 2019 and remains a folk hero for the confetti-covered corner three that ended Philly’s season. He turned 35 in June and knows a lame-duck year with the Clippers helps nobody.
The expectation, per Hoops Rumors and ESPN, is that Silver’s office rules before Raptors training camp opens. That gives everyone about six weeks. If the league takes longer, or if the sides fight the findings, this thing could slide into 2027. That would be a disaster for Toronto’s roster planning and for a Clippers front office already staring down a full rebuild.
The gamble for Masai Ujiri is obvious. Kawhi at 35 is not Kawhi at 27, but a healthy version paired with Scottie Barnes and RJ Barrett flips Toronto from a lottery team into a real Eastern Conference threat overnight. The Raptors have been swinging for a superstar reunion for years. They finally landed one, if the league lets them keep it.
Watch the news out of the commissioner’s office over the next month. Everything on both franchises is on pause until it drops.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
