Reports emerged yesterday that Kawhi Leonard wants to be traded away by the San Antonio Spurs this offseason, and his preferred destination is rumoured to be the Los Angeles Lakers.

The Lakers have enough cap space on their roster for two max contracts this offseason, as well as a couple of players and picks which the Spurs may be interested in, so a trade between these two teams is definitely possible.

However, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN, Los Angeles might not be the preferred trade partner for San Antonio, as they might be more inclined to trade this offseason with another NBA powerhouse, the Boston Celtics.

Leonard to Celtics?

The reason why Woj thinks the Spurs might pick the Celtics over the Lakers is because of what they can offer them in return for Leonard. 

The ESPN reporter proposed a hypothetical trade of Leonard for one of the Celtics' young forwards (likely Jaylen Brown), the 27th overall pick in the 2018 draft, the Kings’ first-round pick in 2019 (No. 1 overall protected), as well as other pieces if necessary.

There's a good chance that Boston may put in some sort of offer, whether it will be one above or not remains to be seen, for Kawhi as reports this week from ESPN stated that there were interested in trading for the Spurs star back in February this year.

They sent San Antonio an offer, but they turned it down with no counterproposal.

Leonard has the opportunity to opt out of his current deal with the Spurs next year, so the team might be more willing to trade him this offseason in order to make sure that they don't lose him for nothing.

Kawhi is up for a $219 million super-max extension this summer whether he goes, and there are only a handful of teams around the league that would be able to offer such a deal. The Lakers are one of those teams that could do that.

There are plenty of other suitors for Leonard around the league too, and with that, the Spurs can afford to trade him to the highest bidder. This puts the Celtics and the Lakers in a tough situation as they will face tough competition for Leonard's signature this summer should they choose to pursue him.

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