Spurs’ Leonard determined to be among NBA’s elite,
Huge payday can’t stop small forward with big work ethic.
San Diego State coach Steve Fisher was walking through the Aztecs’ new practice facility one day this summer when he heard basketballs bouncing on the other side of a curtain separating one court from another.
He peeked around the partition and was only marginally surprised at what he saw.
There was Kawhi Leonard, Fisher’s former pupil and the Spurs’ new $94 million man, working out.
“Every shot he took looked like it was Game 7 of the Finals,” Fisher marveled recently. “It was perfection. Like, he never missed a shot.”
The financial windfall of the summer apparently hasn’t driven the gym rat out of Leonard, the 24-year-old reigning NBA defensive player of the year.
Not long after signing the maximum five-year deal that will take his salary from $2.89 million last season to $16.5 million in 2015-16, Leonard headed to his native Southern California for the opposite of R&R. This was a working trip. As usual, Leonard took Spurs development coaches Chip Engelland and Chad Forcier with him.
The difference this time?
“He only dragged us to the gym two times a day instead of three,” Engelland said with a laugh.
The Spurs are betting — and big — that Leonard’s never-changing work ethic will make him a game-changer in this season’s championship push.
The 6-foot-7 small forward last season led the team in scoring (16.7 points per game) and steals (2.3), and ranked second in rebounding (7.2).
Leonard raised eyebrows around the league this summer when he told his hometown newspaper his goal is to become the NBA’s most valuable player.
Before the start of his fifth Spurs training camp last week, Leonard clarified those remarks.
“That’s not my goal this year, to be MVP,” said Leonard, who was the MVP of the Spurs’ NBA Finals victory over Miami in 2014. “I said I wanted to be a player that was on an MVP level. I do want to be recognized as one of the best when I retire.”
To that end, Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said he is eager to see how Leonard responds to being a focal point of opposing game plans.
“People are going to come after him,” Popovich said. “If you want to be a Hall of Fame-type player, all those guys do it night after night. He’s got high goals, and I don’t have any doubt that he’s going to get better and better.”
With a bigger paycheck, it seems, comes greater responsibility.
Had it not been for the defection of All-Star forward LaMarcus Aldridge to San Antonio, locking up Leonard for the long haul might have been the biggest news of the Spurs’ offseason.
A restricted free agent upon the expiration of his rookie-scale deal July 1, Leonard was on the market for about 60 seconds.
Just after the stroke of midnight, he formally agreed to the framework of a contract that had been in place for months.
The pay raise was nice, Leonard said. Better was the peace of mind that comes with knowing he would have a job for the next half-decade.
“It’s good to know you’re going to be able to play for five more years,” Leonard said. “That makes me happy.”
He could have played out his free agency. He could have signed a shortterm deal that would have delivered him to the freeagent market again in a few years, when the salary cap is expected to spike and more money will be available.
Leonard, however, had no interest in playing elsewhere.
“I didn’t think I was going anywhere,” he said. “I would rather spend my career with one team.”
Asked at the start of camp if he feels added pressure to live up to his new contract, Leonard responded with one word: “No.”
He will be the Spurs’ second-highest paid player this season, behind only former Texas Longhorn Aldridge and his $19.5 million.
As of now, Leonard is the only player on the roster under contract after 2019.
If this summer’s surprising addition of Aldridge postpones Leonard’s full arrival as the “face of the franchise” — as Popovich has predicted he will one day become — then so be it.
“Kawhi’s coming into his own just fine,” said Tim Duncan, who will remain the face of the Spurs until the day he retires. “He’ll be the leader here when he needs to be. This is going to be his team eventually.”
Until then, and even after, Leonard vows to continue to do what it takes to grow into the job.
No amount of money, he says, will change that.
“Not everybody wants to be a great player,” Leonard said. “They’re just planning to stay in their role. I’m just trying to be the best player I can.”