Kawhi Leonard has dominated headlines all summer and he’ll likely be featured in the rumor mill until either the Spurs trade him or he commits to playing in San Antonio long-term. Rumors of the Raptors making a play for the disgruntled star made rounds during Summer League, and other teams such as the Sixers and Celtics come up in speculation about where Leonard is going to play next season.
Most of the news may simply be noise, as Leonard has long been linked to Los Angeles, the only city he reportedly wants to play for. Cris Carter of Fox Sports hears that Leonard hasn’t changed his stance.
“Nothing’s changed from Kawhi’s side from these standpoints: He still wants to go to Los Angeles, and he’s still not interested in being rented out for one season, so that being Philadelphia, Boston, Toronto or any other team,” Carter said on First Things First on Friday (Twitter link).
Carter, a Hall-of-Fame NFL wide receiver, is an unlikely source for NBA news, though he appears to be dialed into the situation. Longtime sports agent Mitch Frankel, who represents Leonard, was Carter’s agent during his NFL playing days.
Carter relayed that Leonard’s camp has remained in contact with the Spurs and they were told by the organization that they’d be notified if the club was closing in on a deal. That hasn’t happened and no rival team has been in contact with Leonard, something that would typically happen if another team was in conversations to acquire a player in a trade.
Leonard’s camp considered issuing a press release about the rumors of Toronto making a play for him, Carter added. No such thing has since been released and the silence from Leonard’s people is partially to blame for the rampant speculation about the Raptors swooping in and acquiring the former MVP candidate, Sean Deveney of Sporting News writes.
Deveney believes that a Leonard trade remains distant and adds that it’s easy to see why NBA executives are connecting the dots between Toronto and San Antonio. GM Masai Ujiri has the ammunition to pull off a trade that provides value to San Antonio while maintaining Toronto’s status as a serious Eastern Conference contender.
Such a deal could be centered around a package of DeMar DeRozan and young prospects or picks and the Raptors have a deep enough team to give up two or three contributors and still surround Leonard with a top-ranked cast.
However, Deveney believes it would be foolish to make the trade for Leonard without assurance that he’ll stick around past the 2018/19 campaign. For the Raptors or any team outside of Los Angeles, getting that long-term commitment doesn’t appear to be in the cards. Leonard is a generational talent, but for those non-Southern California teams, the risk may be even greater than the reward and a trade seems unlikely until that ratio tilts in one of the other 27 organizations’ favor.
Stalemate. Lakers turn to up their offer.
Why should they bid against themselves?
If the Lakers won’t give them anything, San Antonio can just hold on to him. He can’t sit out the season, he wouldn’t be available for free agency next year.
sounds like the name of a chapter for ASOIF
If he really wants to go L.A., without an intervening rental, then saying it (or having someone else do it for you) isn’t the best way of accomplishing it. Amateur hour in terms of his agents.
A team might acquire him as a rental in any event, if they want to get off another large contract. It was always problematic for Toronto to sign DeRozan for max, with Lowry, with the other deals they had in place. DeRozan is the most movable. I could see them viewing a rental as a win-win for this season and longer term, regardless of what KL does.
With the credible information Carter has been giving out (also reported what was said in Pop and Kawhi’s meeting), no way do I make offer if I’m Philly, Toronto, or Boston. This article said let the Lakers and Clippers battle it out. Video is on Fox Sports.
But if you were toronto you would think now would be the time to go all out knowing you probably need to rebuild anyways? Kinda also shows how kawhi agent is out of his league. He has no NBA connections and has to use Cris Carter to get his word out. Kawhi could settle a lot if he quit being a coward and just came out and said some stuff. Spurs probably could get rid of this mess sooner and yes it’s a mess. I would want no part of a uncle who trying to control things even with the doctors. Also if anyone thinks with how the spurs handled his injuries is a fool. This is the team that shut him down on the Western conference finals because of a sprained ankle. Also his new York doctors weren’t able to get him healthy from his quad bruising.
Kawhi is doing exactly what Kyrie did, except Kyrie was open to going to more than one team.
Yes but you are likely giving up pieces thatbwoukd helpnfor a rebuild like draft picks or a young player like OG. these rumors make little sense other than a salary dump by the raps.
Cris Carter mobbed up with former agent Mitch Frankel giving us NBA secret info…don’t make me laugh. I thought KL uncle was his GO -TO guy with the secret info….Now he has a real agent? I NFL agent who used to handle CC. Wan’t CC the guy who told NFL players to have a posse and a fall guy to handle ”uncomfortable” situations for them. After hours fall guy like the movie ”Things Change” ”the car she came around the corner. I shot the sonofabitch three times”
Cris Carter was with Frankel, Kawhi, Jonathan Simmons, and others in Las Vegas. They have pictures. Kawhi left when Carter left. Nobody has to believe it. I’ll listen to Carter. What he says makes sense.
Video-Fox Sports-Cris Cater reacts to report Kawhi is headed to Toronto.
Bleacher Report and ClutchPoints show picture of Kawhi in Vegas with Jonathan Simmons.
I’ll continue to look for where I got Carter being there at same time. Carter says in video that Kawhi was in Vegas day before, but he’s not there any more.
FirstThingsFirst-July 10, “Pop says in meeting with Kawhi, he has every intention of trading Kawhi and he wants to try and make him happy.” Yahoo, ESPN, CBS, USA Today, Sports Illustrated, Sporting News, twitter have reported Carter connection.
“Generational talent “ is thrown around too flippantly.
Totally agree with that term generational talent seems very far fetched for a guy that is basically a great defender that has had to work very hard & very long to become offensively relevant… but that is just me. As I said before he just makes my top 20 of the league, so I wouldn’t call him that. Also he hasn’t had a healthy season in 7 years as a pro, don’t think will start any time soon.
If it is LA only, then is the time for Lakers to really reduce big time their offer, get as low as you can, why offer more for a guy that is not going anywhere else, San Antonio had almost no leverage, now none at all left, they totally lost the game with Kawhi.
Send that overrated Kyrie to San Antonio
Raptors trading DeRozan is them just getting out of his contract essentially.
100% agree with u
Predicting, no trade. TOR would have to send too much to SAS– more than Lowry or Derozan– so they’re out.
Spurs can win without Kawhi though losing Anderson hurts. Kawhi will continue to dishonor his contract like the POS he is and Spurs will sue for breech. And they will keep on winning, not like GSW, but SAS would not beat GSW with Kawhi anyway. But they’re not getting disrespected by Kawhi.
Then it will be up to that agent most appropriate for Kawhi, Chris Carter.
TO is not going to the finals as constructed. TO is handcuffed for the next 2 years as a lux team SO by trading KL or DD and other young assets for Leonard, it would take them out of the tax this year and possibly next year as well.
For Leonard to increase his value, he will want to go full out. If Raps don’t appear to have a chance to get to the finals by trade deadline, they can trade him to acquire some assets. There will be a lot of teams that would trade for him, even as a rental, if they feel he could put them in the finals.
Acquiring Leonard is a win win, even if it’s a 1 year rental.