Kawhi Leonard's personal trainer accuses Clippers of illegally treating NBA star's injuries: Lawsuit
LOS ANGELES - Former Los Angeles Clippers employee Randy Shelton is suing his former team over allegations of "illegal treatment for injuries" involving NBA star Kawhi Leonard.
Shelton's lawsuit, first reported by longtime NBA insider Chris Haynes, claims the employee's complaint to the Clipper over the alleged "unsafe" treatment for Leonard's injuries led to him getting fired.
According to the court documents shared in Haynes' report, Leonard tore his ACL during the 2021 NBA playoffs and underwent surgery in July 2021. According to Shelton, the target date for Leonard to be fully recovered from the 2021 injury should have been 730 days, but the personal trainer claimed that number was deemed "unacceptable to the Clippers."
While the Clippers allegedly agreed to a load management plan at the start of the 2022-2023 NBA season to allow Leonard to recover from the knee injury, the team is accused of going against the said plan by forcing the NBA star to play "significant minutes," according to the court papers obtained by Haynes. This coming in spite of the fact that Leonard "complained of swelling and inflammation in his knees after the first two games" in October 2022, Shelton alleged.
"An MRI revealed cartilage damage to his knee, and Leonard was given biologics to band-aid the problem rather than allowing Leonard the full time required to head," Shelton's lawsuit read, in Haynes' report.
Shelton also accused the team of rushing Leonard's recovery after the Clippers star allegedly ruptured ligaments in his right ankle on November 21, 2022 and then hiding some of Leonard's health information from the now-former trainer.
In addition to allegations of wrongful termination, Shelton accused the Clippers of being "subjected to discriminatory and harassing conduct. Despite the LA Clippers assuring Shelton he would be protected against retaliation, he was not," according to court documents shared in Haynes' report.
Shelton also claims the Clippers hired him in 2019 as a way to get Leonard to sign with the team as a free agent. The former Clippers employee and Leonard knew each other back during their days at San Diego State when Shelton was the school's strength and conditioning coach and the latter was a student-athlete for the Aztecs. In the court documents obtained and shared by Haynes, Shelton accused the Clippers brass of using him for medical insight on Leonard, who was with the San Antonio Spurs at the time of the alleged tampering.
Haynes also shared a statement released by the Clippers regarding the lawsuit filed by Shelton:
"Mr. Shelton’s claims were investigated and found to be without merit. We honored Mr. Shelton’s employment contract and paid him in full. This lawsuit is a belated attempt to shake down the Clippers based on accusations that Mr. Shelton should know are false."
The allegations come as Leonard is currently sidelined at the start of the 2024-2025 NBA season due to a knee injury. Leonard's current injury, a right knee inflammation, was not made public until well after Shelton was fired by the Clippers in July 2023.