The Toronto Raptors’ presence in the LaMarcus Aldridge sweepstakes wasn’t benign lip service after all.
Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports has an excellent break down of the five days at the start of free agency that saw Aldridge decide to leave the Portland Trail Blazers for the San Antonio Spurs, amid meetings with and overtures from several other marquee teams. The piece opens with a story about Aldridge, Spurs coach and president Gregg Popovich, and Raptors general manager Masai Ujiri bumping into each other ahead of the Spurs’ meeting with Aldridge. Popovich jokes about how much the Raptors paid DeMarre Carroll and how much they’d have to pay Aldridge as a result, which prompts Aldridge to laughingly acknowledge the aggression in Ujiri’s pursuit of him.
The Raptors ultimately didn’t lure Aldridge to Toronto for a meeting, which would have been a key component of Ujiri’s pitch. That doesn’t mean the general manager didn’t impress, though, as reports at the time were favourable about the Raptors’ showing. Aldridge was complimentary of Ujiri and his vision when speaking with Yahoo Sports, and even if the Raptors never got past first base, it’s nice to know they made an impression on a marquee free agent.
From Wojnarowski’s piece:
Aldridge met with the Toronto Raptors, whose general manager, Masai Ujiri, had Aldridge enraptured. He found himself intrigued with Ujiri’s vision of the entire country of Canada behind him, telling Yahoo, “There was a genuine spirit about [Ujiri] that made me more interested in Toronto.”
Ujiri lurked in the halls of the Montage for the next 48 hours, carefully crafting text messages to Aldridge, trying desperately to get him on a plane and come visit the city. Ujiri imagined the rapper Drake, a Raptors fan, summoning other fervent fans, packing Jurassic Park outside the Air Canada Centre and somehow willing themselves to a free-agent upset of upsets.
The idea of filling Maple Leaf Square with fans is a really cool one, and here’s hoping the Raptors are in pursuit of another key free agent some time in the future so we get to see what that might look like in practice.
Aldridge ultimately opted for the culture of the Spurs over the familiarity of the Blazers, the glamor of the Lakers, or the star-power of the Rockets. It’s a tough choice to evaluate until playoff time, but Wojnarowski’s story at least makes it seem a perfect spiritual fit.
The Raptors, meanwhile, plucked Cory Joseph from the Spurs after they renounced his rights in order to clear the requisite space to sign Aldridge. So the Raptors didn’t walk away from the Aldridge situation entirely empty-handed.
