What the Kawhi scandal reveals about the NBA's myth of fairness

When considering the unfolding scandal involving Kawhi Leonard and the Los Angeles Clippers, it's worth thinking about alternative scenarios.

What if, say, reports emerged that Spike Lee's film company had paid tens of millions of dollars to Jalen Brunson for no work in return and that the rabid New York Knicks fan also received investments of a similar amount from James Dolan, owner of the basketball team?

No one would doubt how fishy that looks.

What if it were LeBron James receiving huge secret payments funnelled through a company owned by one of the many rich and famous people who sit courtside at Lakers games?

Red flags would fly, and salary-cap alarm bells would blare.

However, the Leonard-Clippers story has been muddled by the fact that the company at the heart of it, the now-defunct green bank and tech firm Aspiration, was little-known and beset by fraudulent financial dealings. This has allowed the Clippers and owner Steve Ballmer to claim that they're a victim in this whole mess, too.

Whether NBA commissioner Adam Silver will buy that argument remains to be seen. Regardless of what he decides, the Leonard scandal has underscored something that's always been true of the salary-cap era across all sports: it promises something that it can't deliver.

The grand bargain of the salary cap, or the luxury taxes that act like one, is that it promotes competitive balance by ensuring that rich teams can't outspend their smaller rivals on the way to success. The idea is that it gives everyone an equal chance to win - fairness, in other words.

But that fairness is a mirage. Even if the reports in the Clippers case are an extreme example - where a team partner allegedly paid almost $50 million to a superstar player for nothing in return - there are countless other ways athletes can receive benefits from their employer outside the constraints of the salary cap.

Use of a vacation home or private jet, investments in the player's side business or charitable foundation, jobs for family members, or even promises made for future earnings - these are just some of the ways a team motivated to save a little money under the cap might easily confer benefits to an employee that don't involve salary.

What's stopping a club from offering such goodies? Ethics, I suppose, and the risk that such arrangements might be exposed if player and team had a falling out. However, it's notable that one of the primary reactions from NBA insiders to the Leonard-Clippers story is that off-the-books perks aren't exactly rare, even if the amounts involved are generally much lower.

Meanwhile, salary "fairness" is undercut in other ways. Players in big markets will naturally have more opportunities to make endorsement money, while those who play in tax-free states like Texas and Florida automatically have significantly more earning power than their counterparts, even if their salaries are similar. Although this isn't the only reason dominant NHL teams have emerged in recent years in the non-hockey hotbeds of Tampa and Miami, it has helped.

Ultimately, a player's decision on where to play depends on a range of factors, with official salary accounting for just one of them. The idea of a level playing field is a nice concept, but what the salary caps and luxury taxes really provide is cost control. Even as sports franchises have skyrocketed in value, these mechanisms hold player salaries below an artificial limit, ensuring owners will never have to share too much of the wealth. They might share a lot of it, but always at a level that suits them fine. The system, now built into every major North American sport, prevents owners from spending freely without restraint.

This is where the Clippers case gets particularly awkward. Steve Ballmer, one of the wealthiest individuals in the world, has proven to be a devoted fan committed to winning during his tenure with the franchise. Does anyone doubt that if the NBA had no luxury tax or salary aprons that he'd be spending much more to build a championship roster?

The allegations before Silver claim that Ballmer essentially did just that by funneling tens of millions to Leonard through a partner. Whatever actually happened - and it's a strange arrangement with a dubious partner, to be sure - it doesn't change the fact that Ballmer is on a short list of people who could kick $50 million into a sketchy side project if it meant a material benefit to his basketball team.

And so, the commissioner finds himself in a tricky spot. He wants proof of salary-cap malfeasance, not just the appearance of it. The problem with insisting on the former, though, is that no one really doubts the latter.

Scott Stinson is a contributing writer for theScore.