BusinessTBPN
Investigative journalist Pablo Torre breaks down how he uncovered an illicit salary cap circumvention scheme orchestrated by LA Clippers owner Steve Ballmer to funnel $48 million to Kawhi Leonard. Torre details the routing of funds through corporate sponsors like Aspiration and Boingo Wireless, the historic NBA punishment levied on Ballmer, and the strategic legal maneuvering behind Kawhi Leonard's minimal fine.
- Steve Ballmer sent a legal letter threatening NBA Commissioner Adam Silver by name with direct litigation over salary cap circumvention penalties. Read →
- Kawhi Leonard received a $700,000 fine with no suspension or contract voiding despite being tied to a $48 million illicit payment scheme. Read →
- The NBA punished Steve Ballmer with the largest penalty in American sports history, stripping five first-round draft picks and imposing $80 million in total financial payments. Read →
- LA Clippers owner Steve Ballmer routed $48 million in off-the-books compensation to Kawhi Leonard across four commercial partners. Read →
- Investigative reporter Pablo Torre spent seven months tracing how the LA Clippers routed $48 million to Kawhi Leonard outside the NBA salary cap. Read →
BusinessTBPN
Hosts John Coogan and Jordi Hays break down the latest wave of AI model releases and Nvidia's $13 billion acquisition of Hugging Face before bringing on a series of guests. Investigative journalist Pablo Torre explains his reporting on Steve Ballmer's alleged salary-cap circumvention scheme with Kawhi Leonard, followed by founder interviews on enterprise AI, specialized hardware, space defense, and model training paradigms.
- Pocket scaled to 300,000 units sold after discovering test users recorded 10 times more often on physical hardware prototypes than on their original mobile app. Read →
- Frontier labs like OpenAI run the exact same reinforcement learning recipes as American and Chinese open-source teams. Read →
- Legacy orbital assets operate on predictable trajectories with fixed propellant reserves, resembling single-use vehicles discarded after their first tank of fuel. Read →
- Nvidia agreed to acquire Hugging Face for $12.93 billion, matching the decimal code of the hugging face emoji icon. Read →
- Investigative reporter Pablo Torre documented $48 million ($28 million in cash and $20 million in stock) routed to Kawhi Leonard outside the NBA salary cap. Read →
- Snowflake posted $1.49 billion in quarterly revenue, growing 37% year-over-year while rolling out AI products like Koko and Co-work. Read →