The Clippers were tampering with Kawhi Leonard while he was still with the Spurs, per lawsuit

10/25/2024 02:00 PM

This may not be a surprise to any Spurs fans, but a former Clippers employee is now coming forward.

Even six years and an era later, the Spurs still can't quite escape the drama that Kawhi Leonard brought on the organization when he sat out most of the 2017-18 season, allowed his entourage to blame and disparage the Spurs' medical staff for what turned out to be an accurate diagnosis, and finally forced a trade in the summer of 2018. This led the Spurs into a slow and at times painful rebuild, but they got their guy in Victor Wembanyama and have moved on — or so we thought.

Per Chris Haynes of Yahoo, a former trainer whose ties to Leonard date all the way back to his time at San Diego State has filed a lawsuit against the Los Angeles Clippers organization for wrongful termination and is threatening to expose the team for subjecting Leonard "to unsafe and illegal treatment, in disregard for Leonard's health and safety and known medical restrictions." The Clippers have unsurprisingly denied those allegations, saying:

"Mr. Shelton's claims were investigated and found to be without merit. We honored Mr. Shelton's employment contract and paid him in full. This lawsuit is a belated attempt to shake down the Clippers based on accusations that Mr. Shelton should know are false."

It is possible that Shelton — who continued to work with Leonard in the offseasons after he left SDSU all they way until he was hired by the Clippers from 2019-2023 — is just a bitter former employee. However, while allegations of possible medical mistreatment may give Spurs fans a bit of deja vu (although in this case, it's not coming from the player), that's not the most notable part as it relates to Spurs. To back up his allegations, Shelton has said he is willing to sit down with the league discuss how the Clippers tampered with Leonard while he was still under contract with the Spurs. Per ESPN:

In the lawsuit, Shelton said the Clippers first contacted him in 2017 after Leonard, who was then under contract with the Spurs, suffered a severe ankle injury in Game 1 of the 2017 Western Conference finals against the Golden State Warriors.

That injury ended Leonard's postseason, and he missed the first 27 games of the next season with a right quadriceps injury. Leonard's injury and subsequent rehab created a rift with the Spurs, leading him to seek a second opinion outside of the organization.

Beginning in 2017, while Leonard remained under contract with the Spurs, Shelton said a Clippers executive contacted him to seek "private health information" about Leonard and expressed the need for "discretion." The two sides spoke approximately 15 times on the phone and had at least seven meetings, according to the lawsuit, as the Clippers sought to learn more about Leonard's contractual obligations with the Spurs and his medical situation...

In his conversations, Shelton said the Clippers executive "discussed bringing Shelton into the Clippers' organization as a strength and conditioning coach, given the personal relationship and trust that Leonard had in Shelton."...

Shelton alleges that the Clippers' recruiting efforts were in "disregard for the NBA's prohibitions on tampering." Article 35 of the NBA's constitution prohibits teams from "directly or indirectly" attempting to entice players under contract with one team to join a different team.

Again, this probably isn't all that surprising to Spurs fans considering how big of a hand Uncle Dennis (nee Robertson) reportedly had in forcing the false narratives against the Spurs' medical staff to justify asking for a trade from a seemingly perfect situation, but if anything coming from Shelton's lawsuit ends up being remotely true regarding the tampering, there could be penalties to pay. Sometimes that is done via fines or a team losing draft picks (although the Clippers even don't own their own first round pick until 2030 — they're in trouble).

The Spurs would probably just as happily accept a public acknowledgement from anyone in Leonard's hemisphere that they were wrongfully accused, leading to a dent in their once sterling reputation in the eyes of many. That may or may not happen, and it could turn out that this is a big nothing-burger brought on by someone with an axe to grind, but if nothing else, it's yet another reason to question Leonard's motivations back in 2018 and will hopefully make those who still criticize the Spurs for the saga to reconsider. (Because apparently his ongoing issues with a CHRONIC knee condition — which the Spurs diagnosed — hasn't been proof enough.)

Oh, and it probably won't help with Gregg Popovich's desire to silence the boo birds.