Raptors’ Leonard a rare talent, no two ways about it
Nothing guaranteed in the year of Kawhi, except it won’t be dull
TORONTO — Kawhi Leonard looks like an apex predator, because he is one. His shoulders are almost comically broad, in both the amusing and comic-book sense; he has a low centre of gravity and that 7-3 wingspan, with arms that stretch to the swooping death of those giant, quick, enveloping hands. Later, you see the quick feet, the skill, and the blank-faced hunger. Predator, all the way.
“You don’t see many Mack trucks that move like Ferraris,” Toronto Raptors teammate Danny Green says.
“Kawhi’s just so naturally gifted with what he’s given to make life harder for you, with his length, his arms, his hands. He takes up so much space and can recover so fast with that length, he makes you uncomfortable dribbling the ball.
“It’s hard to do it at both ends of the floor. Obviously he’s great at both ends of the floor, but it’s hard to be as passionate at that end as he was when he started. Because he takes such a heavy load at the offensive end of the floor. “But he still does it.”
The Raptors season began Wednesday night with a rematch against the ruins of the Cleveland Cavaliers, who swept Toronto for a second straight year in the spring. The Cavs lost LeBron James; the Raptors added Leonard, who has one year left on his contract and a love for his hometown of Los Angeles, where LeBron plays now with the Lakers. For one year the Raptors have the best player in the gym on just about any night in the Eastern Conference now. Welcome to the season of Kawhi.
“I think people kind of forgot how good he is,” Raptors forward C.J. Miles says. “Ain’t nobody really watching San Antonio’s games. No offence.”
Unless something goes wrong, Leonard will play the best basketball in a Raptors uniform that anyone ever has.
Before Leonard did it in 2016, the last non-centre to win defensive player of the year and score at least 20 points per game in the same season was Michael Jordan in 1987.
Ask Miles about the best wing defenders he has ever seen, and whether any are better than Leonard. Or even, as good.
“Kobe (Bryant), when he was young, when he wanted to, he was long, strong. Young Tony Allen was strong,” Miles says. “But (Leonard) is stronger and heavier, so he’s able to take the blows. Draymond (Green) is good in iso situations, but I don’t know how good Draymond is when he has to guard a runner.
“Kawhi, whatever. He figures it out. People don’t realize, they’re talking about the size of his hands, but think about that extra two inches, two and a half, whatever it is: how many balls a game that you barely tip that he steals? And it’s literally that much where it goes from tipping it out of bounds to him tipping it down, and he’s gone. The other day I’m standing in the corner, Freddie (VanVleet) drives, and throws a pass that (Kawhi’s) not supposed to get his hands on. He gets this much on it, a finger, and now I can’t catch it and shoot it, and it changes the play.”
Miles gets in a stance, close up. “And now he’s here, he gets to you, and he’s in it.”
In Cleveland, LeBron was always the atom bomb; in last year’s sweep was marked by his turnaround virtuosity in Game 2, his running buzzer-beater in Game 3, his ability to control anything or everything.
“Obviously LeBron is the best the player in the game for the last 10 years,” says Canadian Cavaliers centre Tristan Thompson, “and having him on our team the last four years has definitely been huge, and gave us huge advantage against a lot of teams, especially in crunch time. You guys saw that in Game 3 with his shot off the backboard.”
“Our team lost the best player in the world, so that’s pretty tough, but we have to move on,” Cleveland coach Tyronn Lue says.
Now the Raptors have their version of that guy, for a year.
“To be a superstar you’ve got to be able to do it every night, you’ve got to be efficient, in my mind, you’ve got to physically be able to control an offence and also a defence,” Cavaliers guard Kyle Korver says. “Today’s game is all based on having space to operate. So many guys are so physically talented and can get to the basket, and the rules of today’s game are to free the players, to showcase the talents and abilities, to make those superstars must-see TV.”
Leonard, for his part, is matterof-fact about how good he is. He said this week his biggest challenge is a new coach, a new system after six years, learning his teammates, he was asked if that was hard. “It’s not difficult,” he says. “But it doesn’t just come with you . ... It’s a lot of details that come into the game rather than just coming out and shooting the ball. I can do that with my skill level, just come out and shoot every possession. I try to win games and I’m trying to be adaptive to the offence, figure out where guys want to shoot the ball, where I’m going to get my shots off at so we can keep rolling.”
It will be a year-long date, and at the end we will figure out if Kawhi Leonard stays in Toronto or not. Green, who was with Leonard in San Antonio, knows him best among his teammates.
“He’s an ultimate competitor,” says Green. “He wants to be great, bottom line. It’s not about money, city; he wants to win games and be great. And obviously there may be places that he wants to do it in, close to home, you never know. But if he can get that here or wherever, he’s going to be there or stay there. Where he feels he can play his best basketball, and have fun, I think that’s what it’s about.”
Welcome to the season of Kawhi. It won’t be boring.