A year ago this month Masai Ujiri traded for Kawhi Leonard because he knew Leonard to be possessed of the rarest form of NBA greatness — the kind that combines two-way basketball mastery with all-world toughness, clutch-gene nerve and unwavering self-belief.
So maybe it shouldn’t have come as a surprise that Ujiri lost Leonard overnight Friday — literally as most of us slept, in the wee hours of Saturday morning — for all the same reasons.
You could mourn Toronto’s loss for all its sad implications, including the grim fact that Toronto’s odds to defend the NBA title dropped from 10-to-1 to 50-to-1 in one betting house.