A blockbuster swap between Memphis and Portland has already shifted the conversation for Toronto, and it may have done the Raptors a favor. ESPN’s Shams Charania reported Monday evening that Ja Morant is headed to the Trail Blazers in exchange for Jerami Grant and Kris Murray, ending what had been one of the league’s most surprising trade sagas.
Morant had been on the radar for plenty of teams, including Toronto at the deadline, but Portland wasn’t the destination many expected. The return also raised eyebrows: two players and no picks for a former All-Star is a modest haul by any standard. Still, the deal is done, and Morant’s time in Memphis closes with a whimper rather than the kind of ending anyone would have imagined when his rise first took off.
For the Raptors, the bigger takeaway may be what comes next at point guard. Toronto’s search for help there has been a steady storyline around the team, even if the buzz has recently been overshadowed by Kawhi Leonard reunion chatter.
The Raptors were tied to LaMelo Ball before he was dealt to Minnesota and had reported interest in Trae Young before he landed in Washington. Morant is now off the board too.
That leaves Jrue Holiday as a name Toronto should seriously keep on the table.
Holiday was one of the top options in a recent look at possible point guard targets after the Raptors missed on LaMelo Ball, and the fit still makes sense. He’s 36 now, so the clock is obviously different than it once was, but his résumé still carries real weight: two championships and a long track record as an All-Defense mainstay. For a Raptors team trying to reshape itself into a contender, that kind of winning presence matters.
The real question is cost. Toronto has salaries it can move in Immanuel Quickley, RJ Barrett, or Jakob Poeltl, but if Portland is the other side of the conversation, Barrett feels like the most likely ask given the Blazers’ guard depth. That would be a steep price, especially after Barrett’s strong playoff run.
Even then, the Raptors haven’t shown much appetite to move Barrett in the Kawhi Leonard discussions either. However that larger pursuit plays out, Toronto’s next swing at upgrading the backcourt could help define the kind of East threat it wants to become.
In Other News...
Raptors May Have Quietly Turned Brandon Ingram Into A Front Office Masterclass
Torontos front office has spent the last year showing how quickly a big swing can turn into a bigger one. After bringing in Brandon Ingram at the 2025 trade deadline and committing to him with a three-year, $120 million extension, the Raptors looked as if they had found a long-term scoring answer to stabilize the roster and keep the post-Pascal Siakam era moving. Instead, Ingrams time in Toronto lasted just one season before he was moved again, and the latest twist has made the original deal feel less like a standalone move and more like one step in a much larger plan.
The sequence running from Siakam to Bruce Brown Jr. to Ingram and then to Kawhi Leonard is the part that makes this all stand out. Torontos path to getting Leonard back required patience, asset management and a willingness to keep reshuffling the deck even after making a major investment in Ingram, who had become a focal point of the roster. In hindsight, the Raptors may have used that short chapter with Ingram to position themselves for the reunion they wanted all along. [Read more 🡒]
Raptors Just Found A Painful Silver Lining In Their Draft Miss
Gradey Dick arrived in Toronto with the kind of shot-making upside that can make a draft night look smart in a hurry, and for a while there was reason to believe the Raptors had landed a useful part of their next core. But the longer view has been less flattering. His development stalled badly enough in the 2025-26 season that his role shrank, turning what once felt like a promising pick into a case study in how quickly a young players path can wobble.
Torontos bigger frustration is not just what happened with Dick, but what it missed while betting on him. Keyonte George, another 2023 draftee, has taken a far more meaningful leap and become a centerpiece type of player for Utah, which is the sort of comparison that lingers around a front office. Even after Dick moved on in the Kawhi Leonard deal, the Raptors are left weighing whether the real pain of the miss is the lost production, or the fact that a player they passed on is now the one looking like a long-term answer. [Read more 🡒]
Raptors Just Got A Worrying New Twist In Mamukelashvili Free Agency
Sandro Mamukelashvilis time on the Toronto Raptors books took another turn this week when he declined his $2.8 million player option, setting up an early path to 2026 NBA free agency. The move had the feel of a player testing a bigger market, and it comes after Mamukelashvili spent part of last season with Toronto following his earlier run in San Antonio.
The wrinkle for the Raptors is that interest around him does not appear to be limited to one lane, with the Los Angeles Lakers among the teams mentioned as potential suitors. For Toronto, that creates a familiar kind of offseason tension: a recent addition with room to grow, a decision point on the horizon and a market that could make keeping him far more complicated than it looked just a few weeks ago. [Read more 🡒]