Raptors Rapture (Toronto Raptors)
Toronto Raptors receive Kevin Garnett from Brooklyn Nets for Landry Fields and Chuck Hayes
The Toronto Raptors are not suffering in the backcourt. Their guards, led by All-Star Kyle Lowry, have led the team to the top of the Atlantic Division. Starting centre Jonas Valanciunas is improving daily. However, the young Raps need a veteran front court player who’s been to the wars and returned with the spoils, someone with unimpeachable leadership credentials. I’m thinking Kevin Garnett.
The Raps have a Power-Forward-by-committee philosophy, and not by choice. None of the incumbents, Amir Johnson, Patrick Patterson and James Johnson, have taken firm hold of the position, and none is likely to. Amir is prone to quarters, or even games, of invisibility, 2-Pat is smallish, and James barely gets on the floor these days. The Raps need a beast under the boards, someone to challenge Atlanta’s Al Horford and Paul Millsap, the Bulls’ Taj Gibson and Pau Gasol, and Cleveland’s Timofey Mozgov, to name a few formidable playoff adversaries.
The Brooklyn Nets, currently sitting just outside a playoff berth in the embarrassing East despite a shabby record, have to know they need to rebuild. While Garnett would likely be little more than a playoff rental for Toronto, the players I propose giving up (Landry Fields and Chuck Hayes, plus our first-rounder in 2016) are irrelevant to the Raptors’ future. Like Garnett’s, their contracts expire this season, and fans would be astonished if the Raps resigned either. The acquisition of the still-young Fields would allow the Nets a painless tryout, at which point they could decide whether to offer him a new contract. Hayes could provide Brooklyn cheap front court insurance in the future.
For the Raps, Garnett’s presence would be as much symbolic as substantial. Kevin wouldn’t see a lot of court time, but his veteran leadership and “refuse to lose” attitude would be a playoff tonic for a Raps’ dressing room which sometimes looks blasé.
The Raptors are beloved by their fans. What they need is to be hated by their opponents and the acquisition of the aging but still feisty Garnett would do just that.
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