Pacers Pick Owed To LA Clippers To Be Forfeited In Leonard Punishment

The NBA announced punishments for the LA Clippers, star forward Kawhi Leonard, Clippers executives, and Leonard’s previous representation on Wednesday afternoon. And while all of those penalties involve people tied to the LA Clippers, the Indiana Pacers are involved in the fallout.

The Clippers, according to the NBA, violated “The salary cap circumvention rules contained in the league’s Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) with the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA).” After Pablo Torre, an investigative journalist and host of Pablo Torre Finds Out, published a podcast report detailing the cap circumvention done by the Clippers, the NBA launched an investigation that was conducted by the law firm of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz.

The NBA’s findings say that the investigation, “Found a pattern of misconduct and multiple significant rules violations by the Clippers organization, a prior offender of the salary cap circumvention rules.” A summary report can be found here.

As a result of the Clippers offenses, they were penalized heavily. Their owner, former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, is suspended for a year. His team is fined $30 million. LA’s President of Basketball Operations, Lawrence Frank, has been suspended without pay for six months. The team’s President of Business Operations, Gillian Zucker, has been suspended without pay for one year.

Leonard is required to pay the league $700,000. His then-business manager at the time of the infractions, Dennis Robertson, is banned from doing business with NBA teams for five years.

There are other penalties, too, and perhaps the biggest one is the Clippers losing several draft picks. LA, as a part of their punishment, is to forfeit five first-round draft selections, one in every NBA Draft from 2029 to 2033.

From 2030-2033, the Clippers previously only owned one first-year pick each year: Their own. In those years, things are straightforward. LA loses their own first-round draft pick.

Things are more complicated in 2029, and that is where the Pacers (and Philadelphia 76ers) enter the mix. In that draft year, the Clippers previously owned two picks with some caveats:

• The Philadelphia 76ers have the right to swap first-round picks with the Clippers in 2029, with LA being protected for picks 1-3 in that scenario. If the Clippers end up with pick four or worse, Philadelphia will have the option to swap their first-round selection with that of the Clippers. The 76ers acquired these swap rights when they traded James Harden to LA in 2023.

• The Pacers sent their 2029 first-round draft pick, unprotected, to the Clippers. This was a key asset in the trade that Indiana made to acquire Ivica Zubac back in February.

The Philadelphia 76ers have the right to swap first-round picks with the Clippers in 2029, with LA being protected for picks 1-3 in that scenario. If the Clippers end up with pick four or worse, Philadelphia will have the option to swap their first-round selection with that of the Clippers. The 76ers acquired these swap rights when they traded James Harden to LA in 2023.

The Pacers sent their 2029 first-round draft pick, unprotected, to the Clippers. This was a key asset in the trade that Indiana made to acquire Ivica Zubac back in February.

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Indiana Pacers center Ivica Zubac (40) plays against the Portland Trail Blazers during the first half of an NBA basketball game in Indianapolis, Wednesday, March 18, 2026. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)

Had the Clippers been stripped of their own first-round pick in 2029, the 76ers would have been impacted – their swap rights would have dropped in value. The pick that LA owned from the Pacers, however, was completely unprotected. It didn’t have a relationship with any other team.

That made it easier to remove from the equation, and that is what the NBA decided to do: They stripped the Clippers of their 2029 first-round draft pick via the Pacers as a part of their cap circumvention sanctions.

It’s a major penalty for LA, and losing a draft selection from another team hurts. The only players under contract for Indiana in the 2028-29 season – the year that determines the draft order for 2029 – are currently Tyrese Haliburton and Aaron Nesmith. Veteran guard T.J. McConnell has a team option in his deal that covers the 2028-29 campaign.

For the Pacers, their 2029 pick being eliminated does little. They already traded it and weren’t going to get it back as a part of this punishment, so the deal they made with the Clippers looks exactly the same: To acquire Zubac, they parted ways with Bennedict Mathuin (has since agreed to contract terms with the New Orleans Pelicans), Isaiah Jackson, a 2026 pick (Keaton Wagler was selected), that 2029 first-round pick, and a 2028 second-round pick (via Dallas). That price won’t change.

The Clippers return has changed, though, as they will only get the 2026 pick (Wagler) and the 2028 second rounder – plus the player contracts. LA said in a statement they intend to challenge the penalties.

While nothing changes for the Pacers in terms of the trade, they are slightly impacted going forward in that they can’t re-acquire their own pick in a future trade. They did exactly that in the summer of 2025, trading their upcoming draft pick in that year to acquire a future selection they previously traded away.

However, a major appeal of a team re-acquiring its own first-round draft pick has been removed thanks to the NBA’s new anti-tanking measures. The NBA Draft lottery rules in 2027, 2028, and 2029 will produce a far more random draft order of teams that finish outside of the postseason, meaning that controlling one’s own pick is far less valuable. Tanking isn’t possible.

Still, the Pacers pick that year is gone. Pending expansion, there will only be 29 picks in the first round of the 2029 NBA Draft as a result of the penalties that hit the Clippers today.

This article was originally published on Forbes.com