When you think of Canadian heroes in the realm of sports, who do you think of?
Wayne Gretzky, Maurice Richard, Mario Lemieux, just to name a few. But what do they all have in common?
They all played hockey.
If you don’t play the sport of hockey, being a hero in the country of Canada can become pretty hard. However, 2019 has been different, with the NBA’s Kawhi Leonard just one game away from grabbing that milestone — he’s led the Toronto Raptors to a 3-2 lead in the NBA Finals over the back-to-back defending champion Golden State Warriors.
With Leonard accomplishing that feat, fans from both Canada and California have their eyes on the odds for where the superstar will land in free agency this summer. Good news for Raptors fans: It’s looking like Toronto very well may keep Leonard — at least according to the odds.
NBA betting sites have the Raptors as the favorite to keep Kawhi Leonard in T-Dot at -105 — I’m sure Drake will be happy to hear about that, especially after improving from +125 odds. And why shouldn’t they? There have been reports that Leonard has purchased property in Toronto. That alone should get Raptors fans excited.
Up next on the odds list after Toronto comes:
Back to Leonard buying property in Toronto. In past franchise history, nobody cared about a Toronto Raptor buying a house in the city — people were just curious about the next Toronto Maple Leafs or Vancouver Canucks game in the NHL. But now, things are different.
Not only is a property being bought by someone outside of hockey, it’s being bought by Kawhi Leonard out of all people – one of the best players in the NBA, a thoroughbred superstar. And for someone who keeps their present and future extremely secure from the media, this is a pretty big deal that he would allow this to leak into the press.
And if you’re Kawhi Leonard, why wouldn’t you want to stay in Toronto? The way that general manager Masai Ujiri has put together the roster of the Raptors, Leonard is in a situation where he would be competing for a championship every season. Also, Leonard is worshipped in the ‘Six’. After single-handedly taking Toronto to the NBA Finals with flashy dunks and buzzer-beating gems, Leonard will forever be royalty in the city (and the country for that matter). Why not embrace that and live like a king?
Honestly, the Toronto Raptors are the only franchise in the NBA that can offer Kawhi Leonard that. Not only can he become royalty of a city, he would become royalty of an entire nation. With the Raptors being the only franchise in the country, the whole country claims them as ‘their’ team. It’s even more of a big deal when you realize that this is the first final round for a Toronto team since the 1993 Blue Jays.
Another appealing factor for Kawhi is the fact that the Raptors would still win 58 games despite him missing 22 games due to a quadriceps injury. The consistent winning would allow Leonard to get plenty of rest and heal properly, which is one of the reasons why they’re now in the NBA Finals with a durable Kawhi Leonard. Also, Toronto would set up an offense that would make Leonard the centerpiece and he would be able to show what he’s fully capable of. If all of those factors weren’t sexy enough, you also have the fact that the Raptors can offer Leonard the most money during free agency.
Kawhi also reportedly has a great relationship with the general manager of the team, Masai Ujiri, who would give Leonard the chance of being their franchise player after risking it all on Kawhi after he played just nine games last season. And not just that, but he was surrounded by controversy with his exit from the San Antonio Spurs. It’s something that Kawhi Leonard appreciates. With that being said, even if Kawhi Leonard does sign with the Los Angeles Clippers, you can’t deny the fact that the Toronto Raptors have done everything they’ve can to re-sign the superstar — and it’s been a perfect pitch.
Even though I agree that the Toronto Raptors should be the odds-makers’ favorite, I also think the Los Angeles Clippers should be brought a bit closer to Toronto than what they are. During the season, the Clippers were very smart to get around tampering charges to let Kawhi Leonard know they were interested in him. They would send scouts courtside during Raptors games throughout the year, and they would let Leonard know that they were watching him.
The Clippers can make a great pitch to Kawhi too, including them having two max-salary cap spots open that could include a duo of Leonard and another superstar — that would immediately make them a contender in the Western Conference. And not just that, but the Clippers are already a winning team and loaded with talent without those two superstars. They would win 48 games in the 2018-19 campaign and make the playoffs, pushing the back-to-back defending champion Golden State Warriors to a six game series.
With that being said, forget what I said earlier, not only would the Clippers be a contender in the West with Kawhi and another superstar, they would be a team with a real chance of winning the NBA championship. And here’s another reason for Kawhi to come to the Clippers, and one that pulls at the heartstrings: He’s from Los Angeles.
Don’t expect the rumor mill to slow down anytime soon with the connections between Kawhi Leonard and the Los Angeles Clippers, this has been going on since the beginning of the season. Why would it suddenly stop for free agency? Toronto may have more to put on the table than the Clippers, but that home city and warm weather factor could come definitely come into play and have Leonard end up in L.A — whether he wins a championship with the Raptors or not. He’s already been on record complaining about the cold weather of Toronto.
There are only two reasons why the Los Angeles Lakers are on the list to land Kawhi Leonard:
But here’s the thing: After the drama that surrounded him with the San Antonio Spurs, I don’t see Leonard going to the Lakers to team-up with LeBron — I don’t see him enjoying the spotlight that would come along with that. We already know how low-profile of a guy that Kawhi is. And it’s not even just LeBron James’ drama that we have to mention either, there’s drama all over the place with the L.A. Lakers.
Despite them not making the playoffs and their season being over, there is literally controversy all over the place for the Los Angeles Lakers. As a result, they’ve been connected to every single high-profile free agent that will be available this summer to try and improve their dismal roster — Kawhi Leonard included.
With that being said, however, it looks like the Lakers’ biggest focus right now is getting Anthony Davis from the New Orleans Pelicans via trade. With Los Angeles putting most of their attention into Davis, I don’t see Leonard signing with the Lakers — especially after already being ‘the guy’ in Toronto. Keep the Lakers on the list, for sure, but I’m not seeing it.
Regardless of what happens, expect a hot summer.
If I were a betting man, which I am, I would certainly take the Toronto Raptors for where Kawhi Leonard will be at the beginning of the 2019-20 season. And it’s funny because I had a completely different mindset than that at the beginning of the year.
Originally, I thought Kawhi Leonard would go ahead and give the Raptors a rental year, and afterwards, ship himself to play for his hometown Los Angeles Clippers — which could still happen, I’m just not as certain as now. Since Kawhi landed in Toronto, it’s been nothing but pros, positivity and improvement coming from the Raptors franchise. They’ve supplied a loaded and talented roster around Leonard, they’ve built themselves a nice brand with the ‘Raptors’ label, they have the rapper Drake as the global ambassador to the team and he’s made the city of Toronto ‘swag’ out with the current culture, Leonard is the centerpiece of that franchise and is treated as royalty in the entire country of Canada, the Raptors can offer the most money to Kawhi Leonard, and the list goes on and on and on.
Honestly, at this point, I don’t know how you can’t bet on the Toronto Raptors. There’s just way too much on the table that they can offer that no other team in the NBA can even come close to. And like I’ve already mentioned, Kawhi Leonard has reportedly bought property in Toronto — sounds like a done deal to me.
The Los Angeles Clippers have been a heavy favorite to land Kawhi Leonard since the season began, and those strong odds still remain to this day — just weeks away from the beginning of 2019 NBA Free Agency. Even though it’s incredibly tempting to stay with the Toronto Raptors, expect Leonard to strongly look into a possible situation with the Los Angeles Clippers. This isn’t just speculation either, there’s a real opportunity that Kawhi could go back home to play.
That’s right, Kawhi Leonard is from Los Angeles, which is the main factor of why the Clippers are such a strong favorite and so close to Toronto in the odds. But that’s not the only reason, L.A. has a few things to offer. Other than the city of Los Angeles, the Clippers also have a stacked roster to provide that brought along a 48-34 winning record in the regular season and also a playoff appearance. Also, other than Kawhi Leonard getting max money, the Clippers will also have an extra spot for a max-contract superstar that could team up with Leonard. That duo to go along with an already 50-win team automatically makes the Clippers a legitimate threat to win the championship right off of the bat — a roster that Kawhi Leonard will be the centerpiece of, which will make him the face of the franchise. He may not be king of an entire nation, but he’ll be treated like royalty in Los Angeles and Clipper Nation, and I’m sure the L.A.-born Kawhi Leonard will be fine with that.
Both the choices of the Toronto Raptors and Los Angeles Clippers are incredibly tempting, and for me personally, it would be a hard choice to make — especially if Kawhi Leonard grabs a championship ring with the Raptors, it’ll make it that much harder to leave cold Toronto. Needless to say, it’ll be interesting to see what choice he makes out of the two — and yes, it will be out of these two.
I’m not exactly sure why the Brooklyn Nets are the third favorite to land Kawhi Leonard in the odds, but I’m assuming the New York City factor is the biggest reason. It’s pretty obvious that Leonard wants to be a major metropolitan superstar, and there’s nothing wrong with that. There’s a few other pros to being on Brooklyn as well.
They’re coming fresh off of a 42-40 regular season record that would give them a playoff appearance, and they’d even steal a game away from the Philadelphia 76ers in the first round. Not just that, but the Nets’ roster is filled with talent including D’Angelo Russell, Jarrett Allen, and Ed Davis. Kawhi could grab max money to join an already winning roster, and he could also team up with another superstar as the Nets have another max slot — which is probably another big reason why Brooklyn is a top favorite to land Kawhi Leonard. A superstar duo (trio if you add D’Angelo Russell) is possible here, especially considering Kyrie Irving reportedly wants to play with the Brooklyn Nets. Could we see a big three of D’Angelo Russell, Kawhi Leonard, and Kyrie Irving? The odds make a lot more sense now, don’t they?
With that being said, however, I would still consider the Brooklyn Nets to be a super long shot. It’ll either be between the Toronto Raptors and Los Angeles Clippers who Kawhi Leonard will sign with.
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