Kawhi Leonard to the Raptors: the Re-Grade 🤝
so we’re regrading the NBA’s biggest trades of all time and today we’re doing the kawhai to the Raptors trade so as a reminder in the summer of 2018 here was the full trade that went down so the first thing to remember here is that kawh Leonard at that point had pretty much set fire to his relationship with the Spurs he wanted out and of course the Raptors decide to pull the trigger get Kawai and a year later after winning a title they looked like Geniuses but trust me it wasn’t that simple because Kawai had previously publicly stated he had no desire to play in Toronto not to mention they were trading away their franchise’s all-time leading score this was a ballsy move for the Spurs their biggest mistake here was prioritizing remaining decent instead of just doing a full rebuild cuz truthfully W never know what other deals were on the table so final grades for the Raptors this was an A minus at the time just because kawhai was a rental he was never going to resign in hindsight obviously an A+ and for the Spurs yeah this wasn’t good
43 Comments
This was definitely an A+ for Toronto. A ring and their team was actually very good for the next 2 years I’d say. In 2020, they were still a very good team with Kawhi. They just didn’t have Kawhi.
A+ for the raptors he got them there first ever chip
Spurs got 4 1st rounders and 4 2nd rounders to date
Toronto would hate Kawhi if they never won and he left after one season. They are just hostile like that, they got the energy of Lakers fans without the franchise history 😂
It's at least worth Noting that the Spurs had made the playoffs in 2018 without Kawhi Playing at all. So from their perspective it was a move that maintained them as contenders.
It's also possible they just weren't particularly interested in the 2019 Draft class so maybe they thought rebuilding at the time wasn't worth it.
All in all it turned out fine for the Spurs. They waited until Generational talent was available and developed some pretty good players in the process
Demar DeRozan to me is wildly overrated. Every team he has been on gets worse with him and gets better by removing him. There's a good reason why. Go look at his playoff stats. I've watched these games in real time and i don't know why he doesn't catch flak like other players who choke. People rip on harden and embiid, but demar is worse — by far. As a score only player who is mediocre at every other aspect, regularly having 3-14, 4-17, 5-21 nights, 0 pts nights, 0% FG nights and owning one of the worst dropoffs from regular season to playoffs in history, he's not a star to me and i wouldn't want him as the top 2 on my team even if it's for free because the guy is just not a winner.
Any trade involving demar is an F for the receiving team.
"He better be a bloody monster."
That's an automatic A+ for Toronto. They got what they wanted.
I’m a Canadian Lakers fan but it was still awesome to see the Raptors win a chip. My family and most of my friends growing up were Raps fans so it was pretty dope
Are you Filipino?
I would think that at the time, for the raptors this trade would be a B- at best. In hindsight it’s obviously an A+, but before knowing the result, you are trading away a guy who just led your team to the #1 record in the east and #2 net rating (which is probably the #1 predictor of success in the regular season and playoffs), has pretty much been an ironman his whole career up to that point, was arguably a top 15 player at the time, and most likely would’ve stayed long term. In return they got someone who was better than Demar, but not by a ton, had a slight chance of staying in free agency but more than likely would’ve left, and had serious injury concerns. And if they kept Demar, they would’ve had an extra year or two of being very competitive and would’ve eventually been able to trade him for future assets if the situation warranted it if they were no longer competitive.
hot take, i think the spurs deserve a higher grade because this trade set the tempo for them being mid until they became bad enough to land victor wembenyama
I think we need to re-re-grade this trade because they held on to Demar just long enough that their tanking season got them Wemby. Yeah if they tanked earlier they might have rebuilt sooner, but then they wouldn't have been in the race for Wemby. If Wemby wins a single ring with the Spurs, it will have been worth it for the Spurs.
The Heat don’t wanna be in the playoffs
Ox said he seen bigger😂
I hope Sac and Chicago end up in the playoffs. They’ll burn the play-in tournament to the ground before you can say next season
D3 is smokin dust. 16 teams, fuck the play-in, fuck a conference.
Capitalism will not allow a shortened season. It would be a better product at 60-69 games. The Bill Simmons season he just designed after all star sounds perfect
And send the grizzlies asses out east! Memphis ain’t west of shit. Minnesota too.
The Nuggets don’t need Jaren’s no rebounding ass
Hali the difference for Indiana but he ain’t saving Miami. They have maybe 5 playable guys
Kawhi leaving is what allowed the Spurs to draft Wemby, Kawhi leaving stung at the time but if he had stayed we never would have won anything with how inconsistent his health is
I’d say the spurs get an A+ if they don’t stay somewhat relevant those couple of years they would’ve got high lottery picks and ended up missing wemby most likely
You didn't go far enough. This trade got them Keldon, who's still with the team, Demar and Jakob. They traded Demar to the Bulls (sign and trade) and Jakob to Toronto for more picks, eventually bottoming out to get Wemby. The Chicago pick used to get D'Aaron Fox came from the Demar sign and trade from the Spurs to the Bulls.
The Spurs also got Harrison Barnes when Demar was traded from the Bulls to the Kings. That last one wasnt a direct result of the Kawhi trade, but it's a nice little tidbit.
Bro how is it an A- when he won them their first chip in franchise history???
If the spurs got better value they couldn’t have tanked for Wemby.
What a dumb revisionist take. Kawhi value was very low because he was a star who made it clear he only had 1 destination in mind and only had 1 year on his contract. Also the spurs were top contenders at the time so it's hard to say go from that to a full tank. Also EVERYONE knew the raptors had him on a rental and basically sacrificed everything for 1 year and it worked out but they got a very lucky run. Don't know ball
Usually rental trades for stars is a terrible idea, the raptors absolutely capitalized and it didn’t stop them from starting a rebuild almost instantly. Now with their young core they’re probably gonna be back in contention within 2 years
Spurs wanted him out he didn’t mind playing there but the spurs set fire to there relationship with him
Raptors easily won this Trade, spurs been first rounded by my nuggets 1 time and then lost the play in twice, wemby gotta bring them back lmao
We don’t get Wemby without trading Kawhi.
Spurs did the right thing waiting on Wemby before they rebuilt. Wemby will win 10 rings minimum
It was a B for the Spurs…Kawhi wasn’t going to ever play again for the Spurs, so they got DeMar, Poertl, and Toronto FRP (protected 1-7, and we got the 8th pick in 2024 draft, which turned into 2031 Minnesota unprotected FRP).
We traded DeMar to Chicago for Chicago FRP, which we used in trade to get DeAaron Fox.
Yea…Spurs did pretty damn well…B at minimum.
🏀
I wanna see an alternate timeline where they moved him for Jimmy Butler. I know the Spurs avoided him because of his reputation at the time, but for sure they could have gotten him and tried it out, probably without throwing in Danny Green.
We most likely wouldn't have gotten Wemby then so like… It was worth it
He didn't do a full breakdown because the Spurs traded Jakob back the Raptors for another 1st that last year's 8th overall that turned into the Fox trade
I wish derozen was the one who won Toronto that ring
If he resigned probably would've done back to back (idk if kawhi was injured that season kinda took a break from nba during 2020 didn't start watching again til the 2021 playoffs)
Kawhi Leonard was fed up with Pop's politics and used his uncle to leave San Antonio (pray for us).
For the Spurs, it eventually lead to us getting the future GOAT…Victor W.
Luka should’ve done the same as Kawhi and dipped
That would've been hilarious