The NBA dropped an atomic bomb on the Los Angeles Clippers on Wednesday, nearly one year to the day after Pablo Torre of Meadowlark Media first reported on their alleged scheme to circumvent the salary cap by helping facilitate a "no-show" sponsorship deal between star forward Kawhi Leonard and a now-bankrupt environmental startup that was one of their business partners.
After sifting through the findings from the independent investigation conducted by the law firm of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, the NBA stripped the Clippers of five first-round picks, doled out a $30 million fine and issued suspensions to team governor Steve Ballmer, president of business operations Gillian Zucker and president of basketball operations Lawrence Frank.
However, the NBA's announcement raised questions about one of those stripped picks.
Which pick did the Clippers forfeit in 2029?
The NBA said the Clippers were being forced to forfeit first-round picks in each of the 2029, 2030, 2031, 2032 and 2033 drafts. The Clippers had control of their picks in 2030 through 2033, so those were relatively straightforward, but 2029 was not.
As part of their trade for James Harden in the fall of 2023, the Clippers agreed to trade swap rights on their 2029 first-round pick to the Philadelphia 76ers as long as it fell outside of the top three. They later acquired the Indiana Pacers' fully unprotected 2029 first-round pick at this year's trade deadline as part of the Pacers' deal for Ivica Zubac.
The NBA did not specify which 2029 pick the Clippers would be forfeiting. But if they were forced to give up their own pick, that could wind up unfairly impacting the Sixers, who agreed upon the Harden trade long before the cap-circumvention allegations surrounding Leonard first arose.
The NBA was mindful of that, as Adam Aaronson of PhillyVoice relayed.
The Sixers own top-three protected first-round swap rights with the LA Clippers in 2029. I am told by an NBA spokesperson that that will remain the case; LA is being stripped of the Indiana Pacers' 2029 first-rounder.
— Adam Aaronson (@SixersAdam) September 2, 2026
TLDR: Sixers' 2029 Clippers swap will remain exactly in tact.
The Sixers already might be peeved that the NBA overhauled its lottery system for the 2027, 2028 and 2029 drafts, which could impact the likelihood of that pick swap conveying. As long as the Clippers aren't one of the league's three worst teams, they might wind up having a higher chance of landing a top-three pick—up to 24.1 percent—than they would have under the previous system.
Of course, the penalties that the NBA doled out Wednesday could also have the opposite effect. If the Clippers see this punishment as a death penalty for their chances of building a competitive team around Darius Garland and Brandon Ingram, they might look to strip their roster for parts and begin replenishing their war chest of draft picks ASAP.
If the Clippers finish with a bottom-three record in the 2028-29 campaign, they'll have only a 16.4 percent chance of landing a top-three pick. LeBron James might not still be with the Sixers by then—unless his f--kery goes on through his age-44 campaign—and the Sixers could undergo plenty of transformation of their own with Joel Embiid, Jaylen Brown, Tyrese Maxey and VJ Edgecombe's contracts all set to expire after the 2028-29 campaign.
But barring a drastic teardown, the Sixers' top-end talent alone (even sans James) suggests that they're likely to finish with a better record than the Clippers that season, particularly in the wake of this punishment. That should put the pick swap in play.
If the Clippers do land a top-three pick, will the NBA allow them to keep it and spend it on a foundational piece who can help them emerge from the Leonard circumvention wreckage? Or would the league strip them of that pick and give them the Pacers pick instead?
Based on what both Aaronson and Zach Lowe of The Ringer reported, it appears as though the Clippers will be losing the Pacers' 2029 pick either way. That means the Clippers might spend the night of the 2029 lottery praying to the gods of ping-pong balls to help them land a top-three pick.
In fact, that might be their only way out of this mess.
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