The Toronto Raptors can take solace in the fact that the Brooklyn Nets‘ grand experiment featuring a collection of superstars has imploded before it really ever began. After the drama surrounding Kyrie Irving, it appears as though Kevin Durant is calling time on his time in New York.
Durant asked Nets owner Joe Tsai for a trade, stunning the Nets’ fanbase and showing Sean Marks’ incompetence as a GM. While the Suns and Heat have been mentioned as potential landing spots given their desire to compete and their respective boatload of assets, every team in the league will have some degree of interest.
The odds of the Raptors actually trading for Durant are infinitesimally small. It’s probably not going to happen. However, Masai Ujiri is likely going to explore all avenues when it comes to improving this team, and he won’t rule out a Durant trade until that next Adrian Wojnarowski bomb takes him out of the hunt.
The Raptors have a Rookie of the Year in Scottie Barnes, an All-Star in Fred VanVleet, and an All-NBA player in Pascal Siakam. Even if Ujiri is hesitant to give up Barnes, every other player on the roster, irrespective of skill and contract situation, should be considered as potential Durant fodder.
Kevin Durant has requested a trade out of Brooklyn, sources tell @TheAthletic @Stadium.
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) June 30, 2022
The Toronto Raptors must make everyone available for Kevin Durant.
Surely players like Siakam and VanVleet would be off the table in trade talks for Durant, right? Absolutely not. Ujiri has already traded DeMar DeRozan for a disgruntled superstar in Kawhi Leonard, so he’s willing to throw sentimentality to the wind to acquire the right player.
Durant is still a 50-40-90 scorer despite a high volume of shots and defensive attention. His Nets career showed that he could still reach new heights in terms of efficiency and shot-making. Even at his advanced age, Ujiri needs to sell the farm for someone under contract until 2027.
Durant has had some nice things to say about the Raptors in the past, and joining an up-and-coming team with a proven champion as a head coach might appeal to him over some of the other contenders or near-contenders in the league.
Here’s a completely random video of Kevin Durant saying amazing things about the Toronto Raptors… pic.twitter.com/cWTANIybHF
— Sid Seixeiro (@Sid_Seixeiro) June 30, 2022
The Raptors are almost assuredly not going to acquire Durant. However, no one thought Toronto would finalize the Leonard trade until the eleventh hour. In the event that Durant is OK with a trade to Toronto, the Raptors need to make sure that they give Brooklyn an enticing enough package.