Report: Nets' Asking Price for Kevin Durant is So High Nobody Can Afford to Pay it
A Kevin Durant deal doesn't appear to be happening any time soon.
The Brooklyn Nets' asking price for their superstar forward is reportedly so high that teams believe they cannot pay it and maintain a championship-caliber team even with Durant, according to ESPN's Brian Windhorst.
"If you execute a trade that makes your team weaker, then the point of you calling to acquire Kevin Durant has failed," Windhorst told ESPN's NBA Today. "So here we have something that's extremely valuable that nobody wants to buy at its price."
Navigating the Nets' asking price isn't going to be easy for the Toronto Raptors who are reportedly unwilling to move Scottie Barnes in a deal for Durant and don't have a ton of high-end depth that the organization could consolidate in a trade.
That's the biggest difference between pursuing Durant and the Kawhi Leonard trade the Raptors pulled off in 2018. Back then, not only was the Leonard asking price much lower than Durant's but Toronto was loaded with bench depth and could afford to move its third-string center Jakob Poeltl in a deal. This time around, Toronto can't afford to move two or three members of the core and still contend for a championship even with Durant leading the way.
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