Amid all the noise surrounding Kawhi Leonard and the Los Angeles Clippers after the NBA's ruling, Shams Charania has revealed the status of his move to the Toronto Raptors.
The Los Angeles Clippers and Kawhi Leonard have been under NBA investigation for salary cap circumvention for nearly a year. The league announced its ruling on Wednesday and it's bad.
The franchise is facing severe punishments including forfeiture of first-round picks and bans for top executives. Leonard himself has gotten off relatively easy with a $700K fine.
Even before all this came out, Kawhi and the Clips had already agreed to move on, and a trade was agreed with the Toronto Raptors. Following the NBA's verdict, there is an update on that situation.
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The NBA had announced that any punishment Kawhi faced as a result of the investigation would carry over if he joined a new team. As such, his trade to the Raptors had been put on hold.
However, the player himself is facing no suspensions or time missed in this scenario. And as such, Shams Charania has explained what the future of his move looks like.
"His contract was not voided, he was not suspended," Charania said on ESPN. "So all systems are a go. Everything is on track for Kawhi Leonard to be traded now to the Toronto Raptors.
"This was the last piece of information the Raptors were waiting on. For this investigation to conclude. To go forward with the trade.
"The full expectation around the Raptors and around Kawhi Leonard and the league is that this trade will be going through in the next few days."
Considering how heavily the Clippers will be damaged after this verdict, it remains to be seen if they try to deny Leonard his move after all. Barring anything like that, Kawhi should be headed back to the franchise where he won his second NBA championship.
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