After a few great seasons with DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry, the Toronto Raptors realized that this team had a ceiling that wasn’t an NBA championship. Even though they were consistently near the top of the East, at some point, it became clear that they couldn’t get past LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers. Getting eliminated in three straight seasons directly by the Cavs pushed the Raptors’ front office to make some massive changes by trading DeRozan for Kawhi Leonard.
At that time, Leonard was at odds with the San Antonio Spurs over his injury and was looking for a way out. At the same time, Masai Ujiri decided to gamble by sending away the face of the franchise. This player guaranteed them a fight at the top of the East every year, for a guy with a lengthy injury history, but also a championship pedigree.
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The Raptors gave Leonard everything. The keys to the team as their absolute leader, and the option of load management to avoid injury issues. Long story short, the Raptors reached the Finals on the back of an unbelievable playoff run from Leonard, which many compared to Michael Jordan because he dominated on both ends of the floor, especially from the midrange.
He averaged 30.5 points, 9.1 rebounds, and 1.7 steals on 49.0 percent shooting, and his most iconic moment came when he hit the first Game 7 buzzer-beater in league history over Joel Embiid.
In the Finals, they beat the Golden State Warriors, who were chasing a three-peat and had just become the first team since Bill Russell’s Boston Celtics to make five straight NBA Finals. However, along the way, they lost Kevin Durant and Klay Thompson to devastating injuries, and that was basically the end of their story. The Raptors won the first championship in franchise history, and Kawhi was crowned Finals MVP, his second career one, averaging 28.5 points and 9.8 rebounds.
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Kawhi shocked Ibaka and left for the Clippers
But just when everyone expected the Raptors’ reign to last at least a few more years, since Kawhi looked like the best player in the world at the time, he shocked everyone and left for the Los Angeles Clippers. His former teammate, Serge Ibaka, looked back on the situation during those days on the Hello and Welcome podcast.
“Yeah man I don’t like to talk about it,” he said. “I didn’t try to actually recruit him because I didn’t believe it. I thought he was going to stay. I didn’t think he was going to leave actually. I was like, we’ve just won the championship, we have a great team, you know, he can take as many off games as he wants to, the team’s still going to win without him. So, he got a lot of pressure, whenever we’re going to need him in a game, he’s gonna be there. If he’s having an off night, he has guys that are going to help him. So I didn’t really think Kawhi’s going to leave. I was like we’ve just won, who does that? If he doesn’t leave, two more.”
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Leonard wanted to return home
Even though Toronto wasn’t as attractive a destination as, for example, New York or Los Angeles, which Kawhi ultimately chose, just the idea of turning a franchise like the Raptors into a dynasty would have elevated his legacy. But Leonard decided to return home, which may be one of the reasons why, at the peak of his career, he walked away from a team that had just won a title.
That team really did look like it had the potential to win another championship with Leonard playing at that level, along with young rising star Pascal Siakam and the defensive twin towers of Gasol and Ibaka. Nick Nurse was the head coach of that group, and he managed them brilliantly. They were a team that played to win with a defense-first mentality. A bit of an old-school squad with two bigs and a midrange-dominant superstar.
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Kawhi’s departure at the time shook the league, and among those surprised who also took a shot at him was Scottie Pippen, a player often compared to Kawhi because of his dominant two-way playing style.
“I wouldn’t turn my back on my teammates,” said Pippen. “So winning a title and the way that he did it and the way they did it as a team, I would definitely give them an opportunity for us to go back to the Finals.”
Toronto had the potential to create something special
Pippen, of course, spoke from his own perspective, having won six titles with the Chicago Bulls in the 90s, despite plenty of reasons to leave earlier since he felt underpaid. But he stayed and built his legacy as one of the greatest winners in league history. Leonard could have done the same thing with the Raptors, especially after everything they gave him.
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Toronto was also a calmer environment that suited his personality, but clearly, the desire to go home was stronger. From today’s perspective, it definitely feels like if the Raptors had stayed together for another few years, they would’ve been contenders in the East. Gasol later went to the Los Angeles Lakers, and Siakam ended up with the Indiana Pacers, where he made it to the NBA Finals last season.
That Raptors team had an enormously high ceiling and the potential to create something special that would be remembered for years, but Kawhi’s departure brought it all crashing down.
This story was originally reported by Basketball Network on Aug 23, 2025, where it first appeared in the Latest News section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.