The Toronto Raptors moved on from one of the greatest finds in their franchise’s history, as former champion Pascal Siakam was moved to the Indiana Pacers after a messy trade saga that has been going on for a year.
Despite a breakdown in communication between GM Masai Ujiri and Siakam, Ujiri was visibly emotional while talking about how they discovered Pascal and everything he achieved in Toronto.
“I had two African guys that won the championship. I shared that with them. I think of his dad and Pascal at Basketball Without Borders. A lot of people don’t know that Pascal came into Basketball Without Borders in South Africa, he had been admitted into Pastoral School in Cameroon. He only came to Basketball Without Borders to see his sister in South Africa. He was going to go back to school and then, All-NBA, All-Star, all everything, championship. It’s not a stereotypical African championship where he’s waving the flag on the bench, he was scoring, contributing, doing everything you can think of. I have said to you guys, that guy’s success is my success, no matter where he is.”
Masai Ujiri gets emotional talking about Pascal Siakam pic.twitter.com/6on4UZ2AXW
— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) January 18, 2024
Siakam averaged 17.4 points, 6.5 rebounds, and 3.6 assists over eight seasons with the Raptors making two All-NBA and All-Star teams. He will always be remembered for his 2019 Most Improved Player award win, something he followed up by being the second-best player on the 2019 championship-winning Raptors squad.
The Raptors were panned heavily for picking Siakam in the 2016 Draft because of his low floor and high ceiling while they were contending, but Ujiri’s faith fully paid off. Now, Siakam will hope to be the ideal No. 2 to Tyrese Haliburton in Indiana and hope to make them contenders.
Masai Ujiri Admits He Apologized To Pascal Siakam For Not Communicating Well
Masai Ujiri and Pascal Siakam had a breakdown in their relationship over the summer, which prompted Ujiri to call his star players ‘selfish’ and brought about a public response from Siakam. Now that the saga is over, Ujiri has admitted that he should’ve made a better effort at keeping Siakam happy.
“I think the lines of communication in the summer were not that great. Just because sometimes I don’t have answers. And sometimes the answer that I’m giving you is the same answer that I’m going to give you the next time I speak to you. But based on my relationship, Pascal deserved that I even gave him the over-communication, which I didn’t, and I apologized to him for it. I apologized to him before the season started, and I apologized to him again recently. So that part, I’m not particularly proud of, but there are so many things in our business that bring about this type of communication or non-communication.”
The Raptors move into a new era of their franchise, likely building around Scottie Barnes. Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett came over in the OG Anunoby trade and could be long-term pieces, while the Pacers sent over future assets like draft picks to Toronto along with Bruce Brown, who could be further flipped into more assets.
A new era is starting in Toronto, but the franchise will remember that the end of their previous era was particularly rocky for a title-winning core.
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