Andrei Cherny, who co-founded Aspiration and served as its CEO until 2022, has provided his perspective on the nature of the company’s relationship with Clippers star Kawhi Leonard. In a Twitter post relaying comments he made to Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic, Cherny claims Leonard’s responsibilities with Aspiration have been incorrectly portrayed.
“The claim that the contract with Kawhi Leonard was a ‘no show’ contract is false,” Cherny wrote. “The contract contained three pages of extensive obligations that Leonard had to perform. And the contract clearly said that if Leonard did not meet those obligations, Aspiration could terminate the contract.
“The ‘beliefs’ provision is not unusual in celebrity endorsements and merely means we can’t do something like make a vegetarian eat meat as a way of forcing them to break the contract. It doesn’t mean you can have a ‘belief’ of not talking to the camera.”
Aspiration, a now-bankrupt “green bank” company, has been at the center of controversy since Pablo Torre’s September 3 report that Leonard had a $28MM endorsement deal, but didn’t perform any work to earn the money. The Clippers are accused of trying to circumvent the salary cap by using one of their sponsors to funnel extra cash to Leonard and his representatives.
The NBA recently hired a law firm to conduct a thorough investigation of the case. At a news conference this week, commissioner Adam Silver said the burden of proof will be on the league to prove that something improper was done before any disciplinary action can be taken.
“In the months of discussion among our executives before signing the sponsorship, I don’t remember conversations about the NBA salary cap,” Cherny continues. “I signed the contract shortly before I submitted my resignation, but before I left there were numerous internal conversations about the various things Aspiration was planning to do with Leonard once the 2022-23 season began, including emails from the marketing team about their plans in just the week before my last day. I can’t speak to what was done or not done after I left — or why.”
Cherny blames the company’s failure on fellow co-founder Joe Sanberg, who was arrested in March on charges of defrauding investors of $145MM. He claims Sanberg’s actions were the reason he decided to leave in 2022.
In response to Cherny’s statement, Torre received a letter from three former top Aspiration executives, who claim the endorsement deal with Leonard “was presented to the company as a completed arrangement” and was executed by Cherney “despite significant objections from members of the senior management team.”
“The team expressed concerns at the time regarding the high cost of the agreement and its lack of alignment with Aspiration’s brand and business strategy,” the letter states. “While subsequent marketing efforts were undertaken, they were ultimately discontinued and should not be interpreted as support for the deal itself. In our judgment, the Leonard Deal was not in the company’s best interest. It was strategically difficult to justify then, and it remains so today.”
During the 16-minute interview, Ballmer said the company asked him to provide an introduction to Leonard, which he did in November 2021, shortly after Leonard agreed to a four-year, $176MM contract with the team. Ballmer added that he didn’t have any knowledge of the terms of the endorsement contract that Leonard eventually signed and stated that he had no further role in that process.