Leonard absolutely manipulated his move to Toronto. What he did to San Antonio is worse than anything LeBron has ever done to any organization.
How was it worse? He helped SA win a Championship before he left. He didn't leave to guarantee himself a ring to solidify his cred. He didn't ask to be traded to Toronto. He didn't take other players with him to Toronto to try and guarantee a Championship. He was a mid round draft pick who was traded on draft night to Texas. He's from Southern, CA. He worked hard and achieved. The team achieved with him. He got hurt. Both sides probably handled it pretty badly. He didn't go to a team on the cusp of a championship. Things fell into place and he lifted them. They played a badly depleted SF team and won. It wasn't a rigged plan by Kawai. LaBron won the lottery. He went home, loved it but couldn't get over the hump. Left to combine with Wade and brought Bosch to guarantee his legacy. He went back after he had solidified his championship cred, not before. Kawi left SA after he helped bring them a championship.
I stopped at "he didn't ask to be traded" .. he did. Leonard sat out a whole year despite being cleared medically and then demanded a trade. - - that's far worse than LeBron James playing out his contract and then using his rights to free agency. That's why Leonard will be booed relentlessly every time he visits San Antonio. LeBron gets a hero's welcome in both Cleveland and Miami, as he should
You stopped reading. He didn't demand a trade to Toronto. Are you denying Leonard was hurt? What's wrong with asking for a trade when you no longer feel comfortable with the team? A team clearing a player to play who doesn't feel ready may have had something to do with it. You've come to the conclusion that the player lied. FYI he didn't sit out a year. He was injured playing for SA. Teams have enormous pressure to get players back into the game. There is often a conflict of interest regarding injuries. That said I don't know who was at fault. I do know that it was clear that Leonard and SA were done with each other. Based on that asking for a trade seems very sensible. He didn't hold out to go to LA. He accepted the deal SA could get. He didn't engineer a championship or attempt to engineer a championship. You're acting like he pulled a Bell and sat for a year. He got hurt playing ball for SA there was no hold out season.
Exactly, case closed. Popovich pushed Kawhi away from San Antonio, because Popovich thought that Leonard was essentially faking his injury. Kawhi didn't feel healthy enough to play, but Popovich persisted, thus causing a major riff, and ultimately San Antontio sided with Greg Popovich and sent Kawhi to Toronto. I don't think Kawhi ever wanted to leave San Antonio, I think he felt disrespected and back stabbed by Popovich, but ultimately San Antonio sent him away......once upon a time Kobe Bryant asked to be traded out of the Lakers, the Lakers didn't trade him and he ended up staying and winning more titles. Kawhi could have played for the Spurs last year, but Popovich's ego was to large to allow that, so he got rid of him.
THE argument was that LeBron is somehow worse than Kawhi Leonard... that's obviously not true, regardless how you feel about if Leonard was faking an injury or not. That's nothing but a separate side discussion because - - LeBron has both played hurt AND he never demanded a trade, like Leonard --- I get it, the guy beats the hated GS Warriors, lets all suck his dick... But it was only a year ago he pulled a legendary bitch move, we are supposed to revise history now? Attack a guy like LeBron to make that point? super odd
What this is really about is the draft system that ties players to a team for years. It's fine for owners to collude to control players for "Competitive" reasons. What's really happening is the balance of power is shifting to the star players since the draft is a crap shoot. Players are now colluding to get control of where they go. They have effectively used the system to subvert the teams control over players. This might actually be a good thing in the long run. The NBA draft has failed to bring parity to the league. Maybe it's time to let the market decide where all players go. All contracts are maxed to 3 years in length and all players are free agents every year. Teams have the same total salary cap every year. I guarantee we would have more competitive balance.
LeBron created the bitch move blueprint. He did it specifically to solidify his super duper ness in NBA history. He also manipulated the move of Bosh to Miami to guarantee it. Kawi didn't make Pop loss control. Pop decided to try and publicly humiliate him. Game over. Kawi had already won a Championship in SA. Kawi didn't go to Toronto to win a championship with a team he picked and helped create. He went to Toronto to get away from SA and Pop. FYI Bosh who LeBron convinced to move to the Heat so he could have a "big 3" instead of a big 2 said unequivocally that the Heat would have won another championship if Lebron stayes. Why didn't he? Kyrie Erving had become better than an aging Dwayne Wade. The savior returns, along with Kevin Love.
Of course, which is logical since he's such a little bitch himself. Guy can't be bothered to play defense, can't bothered to be coached so he gets his own little bitch airhead like Ty Lue, and thinks he's so brilliant he can be the GM but ends up with shit team construction. And now that he's brittle and injury prone, nobody want to come play with him (not that most wanted to before anyways) Kawhi is twice the player LeBron is
That last line is a stretch. LeBron in his prime was much better than Leonard and LeBron has had a very long period of incredibly high quality NBA play. Leonard has a long way to go to ever be mentioned in the same breath as LeBron in terms of all time NBA greats.
Ive been saying this; get rid of the "max contract". It will end all super teams forever. If a team wants to give a player a $500 million contract for 5 years, SO BE IT. Do you really think you will see a player turn down a $500 million for 5 years and take $100 million for 4 years so he can go play with his buddies? NO FUCKING CHANCE. This would essentially spread out all the superstars through the league so that every team had a star, it would also bring more parity than any thing we have ever seen.
He also kicked Andrew Wiggins to the curb. Kevin Love would have been coming the following year, they could have had Wiggins-Irving-Love all together if Lebron didn't play GM.
I love it! Rockets get younger at PG, The NBA is looking to be promising this year. Except the Knicks of course.
I just wanted Rus to go to a good team. Glad he did. It will be like the olden days. Maybe they should trade for Ibaka lol