Marc Cuban lashes out at Pablo Torre after defending Steve Ballmer amid Kawhi Leonard scandal

Mark Cuban lashed out at Pablo Torre after the two got into a heated debate regarding Torre’s reporting on the alleged Kawhi Leonard scandal.

Torre alleged that owner Steve Ballmer and the Clippers circumvented the NBA’s salary cap rules by giving Leonard a $28 million no-show marketing deal with environmental start-up Aspiration.

Cuban took to X to defend Ballmer, saying he “isn’t dumb” and supporting Ballmer’s claim that he was scammed by Aspiration.

Torre subsequently invited Cuban to talk about it on his podcast, which Cuban accepted.

When Torre promoted the lengthy discussion with Cuban, the former Mavericks owner took issue with how it was presented.

“Pablo, come on,” Cuban posted on X. “You only pushed your side in the promos. Nothing you said made your point. You took lots of information provided by scammers, who negotiated with someone not connected with Ballmer, and took them at face value. Just to be clear. Still Team Ballmer.”

The Clippers denied any wrongdoing in a statement, and Ballmer went on ESPN to explain his side of the controversy.

The NBA announced it is formally investigating.

Ballmer said he invested $50 million into Aspiration and had deals lined up for advertising opportunities, and at one point, naming rights for the team’s new Inglewood arena that opened in 2024.

“We were done. We were done with Kawhi, we were done with Aspiration. The deals were all locked and loaded,” Ballmer told the outlet. “Then, they did request to be introduced to Kawhi, and under the rules, we can introduce our sponsors to our athletes. We just can’t be involved.”

Ballmer said he nor the team were involved in the deal between Leonard and Aspiration.

“We even found the email that makes the first introduction. It was early November,” Ballmer said. “The introduction got made and then they were off to the races on, on their own. We weren’t involved.

“I eventually learned that they had reached a deal. I have no idea what the deal was.”

Aspiration co-founder Joe Sandberg pleaded guilty to two counts of wire fraud for defrauding investors and lenders of more than $248 million, the Justice Department announced in August.

“These were guys who committed fraud,” Ballmer said. “Look, they conned me. They conned me. I made an investment in these guys thinking it was on the up-and-up, and they conned me at this stage. I have no ability to predict why they might have done anything they did, let alone the specific contract with Kawhi.

“I reviewed, my staff reviewed primarily fraudulent financials. Now, should I have sniffed it out? Maybe I feel embarrassed and kind of silly that I didn’t sniff it out, but I didn’t. I made the investment. A lot of other smart investors didn’t sniff it out either.”