Clippers’ Kawhi Leonard on Spurs fans: 'The boos is just love'

Mark Medina | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Despite historic James Harden start, NBA ratings are in decline | Weekly Pulse James Harden, has been impressive on the court this season. But do their stats matter if nobody is watching?

SAN ANTONIO — Between watching Christmas performances on the scoreboard and on the court, Spurs fans enjoyed another holiday tradition Saturday night: Booing Kawhi Leonard.

They booed him during lineup introductions. They booed him any time he touched the ball. They booed him any time he did anything.

Leonard didn’t respond to fans with any words or body language. Instead, he taunted them with his play. Two days after losing to Houston, the Clippers cruised to a 134-109 win over the Spurs at AT&T Center largely because Leonard finished with 26 points on 11-of-16 shooting and had nine assists and seven rebounds.

“The boos is just love,” Leonard said. "Just taking it as that, I’m here for a reason, to win a ball game. It only can make me better and make our team better with the crowd not being on our side.”

The San Antonio crowd has not been on Leonard’s side ever since the Spurs traded him and Danny Green to the Toronto Raptors for DeMar DeRozan, Jakob Poeltl and a protected first-round pick in the 2018 offseason. Leonard did not leave the Spurs as a free agent, as he eventually did with Toronto last summer after helping the Raptors win their first NBA championship with a Finals MVP performance. But the Spurs felt compelled to trade Leonard after becoming convinced he would leave in the 2019 offseason.

In his final season in San Antonio, Leonard played only nine games because of complications with his left quadricep muscle. During that time, the Spurs and Leonard had tension between the team and personal medical staffs, and whether more could have been done to ensure his return.

More: Clippers' Doc Rivers 'open-minded' about NBA's proposal to change schedule

Athlete of the Decade: How LeBron James changed the NBA

Even with Leonard two years removed from that episode, it appears clear that Spurs fans still remain bothered with what transpired leading into Leonard’s departure. So much so that perhaps they remember more about Leonard’s ending than how he blossomed there in seven years and delivered a Finals MVP performance in the Spurs’ championship season in 2014.

“It’s a part of the game. It's the type of player I am, just the way I probably left and how it was portrayed,” Leonard said. “I don’t make no sense of it. I know it’s a game and it’s competitive. When we’re not playing or if I’m walking on the street and I see somebody from San Antonio, they thank me for everything I did. They respect the way I played when I was here.”

Kawhi Leonard with some well reasoned perspective on the boos he still gets from Spurs fans pic.twitter.com/Fgcd2tfZuD — Mark Medina (@MarkG_Medina) December 22, 2019

Between the boos, the Clippers (22-9) and Spurs (11-17) had to respect how Leonard played.

Clippers coach Doc Rivers observed that Leonard “was as sharp as I’ve ever seen him” in a season that he has dealt with ongoing discomfort in the patella tendon in his left knee. He finished with a season-high four dunks. He navigated the Spurs’ persistent double teams. When Leonard took a hard foul courtesy of DeRozan in the second quarter, Leonard quickly stood up. Partly because of Leonard’s increased aggressiveness, the Clippers posted 74 points in the paint. He dominated so much that he sat out the entire fourth quarter after logging 27 minutes.

“He’s a pro, pro,” Clippers forward Paul George said. “He had a job to do. He came in and did it.”

Can Leonard do it again on Sunday in Oklahoma City after not playing in a full back-to-back this season as part of his load management program? One could make the argument either way for Leonard playing or sitting against the Thunder. On one hand, Leonard could play against the Thunder to build off his increased rhythm. On the other, Leonard could sit against OKC so that he can maximize the chances he has games like he did against the Spurs later on in the season.

“I haven't even thought about it. But we'll see,” Rivers said. “I doubt it. It's just too early for me, to be honest. He may bring it up. But I still don't think we'll do it.”

Either way, Leonard looked at his best while the Spurs looked at their worst, on pace to miss the playoffs for the first time since 1997.

“It’s a tough situation,” Clippers forward Montrezl Harrell said. “You can’t really boo a guy who came here and gave it his all. Then he brought a championship to this team with a lot of different vets. I don’t think fans know the reason they’re booing half the time.”

The Spurs fans may have known why they booed Leonard. Regardless, Leonard ignored them. Instead, he gave a proverbial middle finger to those taunts.

Said Leonard: “I’m just happy that we were able to bounce back from that last game and get a win.”

Follow USA TODAY NBA writer Mark Medina on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.