Raptors sign Linas Kleiza to offer sheet

The Toronto Raptors have signed 25-year old former Denver Nugget and restricted free agent Linas Kleiza to a 4 year $18.8 million dollar offer sheet.  Restricted free-agent means that the Denver Nuggets will have up to 7 days to match the Raptors offer. But as put forth elsewhere, Denver will likely balk at paying this type of money for Carmelo Anthony’s backup, especially with a front-loaded offer of $5 million in the first year.

Best option?:

The best option out there was Travis Outlaw but the Nets were willing to spend more than the MLE ($7 million/year) on Outlaw and they got their man. Outlaw will be a good fit in New Jersey regardless of what happens with the rest of the roster.

Kleiza is a good signing for the Raptors once they realized Outlaw was out of their price range, he is younger and provides much of the same skills albeit with less athleticism and upside.

Is he a good fit for the Raptors?

Linas Kleiza will be a key cog in helping to transition to the new defensive philosophy and may help to alter Andrea Bargnani’s ‘softness’ issues as well.

Linas Kleiza is a good fit in his own right. He projects to be a competent 6th man who can provide two very important types of toughness: defensive and mental.  Kleiza is not going to put up 18 ppg, but as his 41 point and 9 rebound outburst against the Jazz can attest to, when given the opportunity and when he is feeling it, he can light it up (remember this was with BOTH Carmelo and Iverson on the floor logging heavy minutes).

Kleiza can be viewed as somewhat of a ‘glue-guy’ and he can help bring some sort of balance to a locker room that was, apparently, in disarray behind the scenes last season. Hopefully he can, along with Turkoglu, act as a bridge for the U.S and Euro players on the Raptors.

The 6’8 245 pound Linas Kleiza spent last year with Olympiakos in the Euroleague and averaged 17.9 points per game and led the Euroleague in scoring. Kleiza is a versatile player as he can play the 2 and the 4 though he is ideally suited for the small forward position.   Kleiza can also get to the line and set a career high in the aforementioned game against the Jazz with 14 trips and 11 free-throws made.

In 2007 Kleiza avergaed 18.6 and 5.4 rebounds with 4.6 trips to the line as a starting forward, which suggets his Euroleague numbers were no fluke, and despite being less heralded than a Travis Outlaw, Kleiza, especially considering his age, does have upside.

Contract

The contract may be a little longer than one would have hoped for when talking about Linas Kleiza but this type of length was necessary to ensure that Denver would not match our offer.

The fact that this is a front-loaded deal works in the Toronto Raptors best interests and later on this season we will likely be asking ourselves how we got Linas so cheap with all the crazy spending that went on this summer.

This deal and dollar amount is a win for the Raptors, even if some Raptor fans have never heard of Linas Kleiza.

All in all, good and underrated signing for our Toronto Raptors!