I'm saying it doesn't matter. LMA nearly signed with Phoenix when they were a repeated catastrophe and had players bad mouth the organization that very year on their way out.
People like to imagine that how organizations treat players matters greatly but it doesn't.
If it did, there wouldn't be any issues with Kawhi, now would there?
They've done everything for him. Pop talked him up as the future years before even a majority of Spurs fans did. He talked him up and celebrated him. Durant was calling him a system player, all the talking heads were downplaying him, but the Spurs had his back. Pop even talked him up as THE best player in the car whole league. What did it get the Spurs?
When he sprained his ankle in game 5, despite the criticism', Pop held him out to protect Kawhi's health. What did it get the Spurs?
They shielded him from the media, he never had to take the big media star in he didn't want to. What did it get the Spurs?
Desperate to help the team, Pop debased himself before LMA to keep him engaged. Not for Pop's own benefit, for Kawhi to have his best chance. What did it get the Spurs?
If doing right by players, if treating Kawhi better and supporting him better than any other team could means so much ... Why is Kawhi doing everything a player could to screw a team over?
Not being with the team, leaving the city for months, getting his own medical team, refusing to talk, having people in his sphere talking trash to the media on his behalf.
If his goal was to screw the Spurs over by simultaneously tanking his value, dividing the team and destroying locker room chemistry, dissuading possible suitors from non-huge markets from even bidding with leaks, and ruining the reputation of a coach near retirement ... then Kawhi is doing a magnificent job!
I'd give him an A+ in franchise killing