Are the 2020 LA Clippers the best NBA team money can buy?

Kawhi Leonard – $32,742,000

The 29-year-old small forward is the second-highest-paid player on the Clippers but we would say he is the best player on the team, and on the shortlist for best players in the NBA. He is a two-time NBA Champion and NBA Finals MVP, a four-time All-Star, three-time All-NBA, a five-time All-Defensive team member, and was named the MVP of this year’s All-Star Game.

Leonard’s $32.7 million salary means we will be evaluating him against players who earn between $40.9 and $26.2 million this season.

His two-way skills, leadership, and championship pedigree will make it a tough task to find any possible players we’d want to swap straight-up for Leonard.

The full list of players in that salary range:

Stephen Curry, Chris Paul, Russell Westbrook, James Harden, John Wall, LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Blake Griffin, Kyle Lowry, Paul George, Jimmy Butler, Kemba Walker, Klay Thompson, Gordon Hayward, Mike Conley, Kyrie Irving, Tobias Harris, Khris Middleton, Paul Millsap, Damian Lillard, Kevin Love, Al Horford, Nikola Vucevic, DeMar DeRozan, CJ McCollum, Andrew Wiggins, Joel Embiid, D’Angelo Russell, Kristaps Porzingis, Otto Porter, Devin Booker, Karl-Anthony Towns, Andre Drummond, Anthony Davis, Bradley Beal, Hassan Whiteside, Nikola Jokic, Jrue Holiday.

We can honestly say that we would not trade Kawhi Leonard in a straight-up deal for any player on this list.

LeBron James is close, but we’d ultimately say no based on the fact that Kawhi is six years younger than him. Anthony Davis is also a very close call, being a few years younger than Kawhi and another candidate for the best player in the league, but again we slightly give Leonard the edge here as well.

The one player we would probably say yes to trading Kawhi Leonard in a straight-up deal just misses our salary-range cut with a salary of $25.8 million this season: Giannis Antetokounmpo.