Happy Birthday Kawhi Leonard: A look back at his most meme-able moments of the Toronto Raptors championship season

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Happy Birthday, Kawhi Leonard!

The reigning Finals MVP just turned 28-years-old!

Are you looking for information on his looming free agency decision? Should he re-sign with the Raptors? Does a different NBA franchise suit him better?

Unfortunately, you've come to the wrong spot for that, but we do have you covered with that elsewhere on NBA.com.

MORE: The case for Kawhi to re-sign in Toronto | Best free agent destinations for Kawhi

Here, you'll find nothing but pure nonsense and funny moments. This NBA superstar may be reserved, but he still knows how to generate some laughs. Take a look back at some of his hilarious, most meme-able moments of the 2018-19 season.

It didn't take long for the Internet to get a hold of good Kawhi content. In his first media availability as a member of the Raptors, Leonard joked with a reporter and his laugh instantly went viral.


And it didn't stop there – this laugh became an on-going joke throughout the entire season. Trolls on the web had a ton of fun with Kawhi's laugh, creatively spinning it in every way possible.


Even other NBA teams got in on the joke. The Milwaukee Bucks thought it'd be a good idea to use the laugh as a way to throw shade at the All-Star forward when his team was in town earlier this season. We all know how that turned out for the Bucks in the long run...


But at the end of the year, it was the "Fun Guy" himself who got the last laugh.


As the season went on, there were more and more funny Kawhi moments. Once the playoffs rolled around and his historic run was underway, there were more cameras on him, leading to more content, and reporters were far more attentive to finding interesting facts and tid-bits about the superstar.

The best example of this ... Board Man Gets Paid. The Athletic's Jayson Jenks did a deep-dive into Leonard's high school and college days to see what interesting stories he could find. He revealed that back in the day, Leonard would score on opponents in high school and college and his trash talk was simple: "Bucket, bucket, bucket." When he locked them up on defence, the trash talk was similar: "No, no, no."

The story gained a ton of traction due to Kawhi's intriguing personality and New Balance even created a shirt for him to rock during the championship parade.

#BoardMan

Of course, the Internet took this another step, as it ever so often does. A mock story about Leonard went viral – something so ridiculous, but just reasonable enough that it could be believable.

Apple time.


Completely untrue, yet still funny.

As the playoffs continued, we got more hilarious Kawhi moments. There was the smirk while dropping a playoff career-high 45 on the Philadelphia 76ers in the Conference Semifinals, which in a timely manner directly resembled the Night King's smirk during the Game of Thrones final season that was occurring simultaneously as the Raptors-Sixers series.

Kawhi-Night-King

In the Conference Finals, he was so locked in he couldn't even dap up his teammate Norm Powell – strictly business.


And he had a number of interview responses that were unintentionally hysterical.

With the Raptors trailing the Bucks 2-0, where would they go from here? Well ... back to Toronto for Game 3, of course.


They rattled off three straight wins to take a 3-2 series lead, and Leonard was asked how to beat the Bucks four times in a row.


In Game 2 of the NBA Finals, Andre Iguodala knocked down a game-sealing 3-pointer in the final seconds. Did the Raptors want Iguodala to take that shot? Of course not, they wanted the ball, obviously.


But once the Raptors won the title, the Fun Guy really let loose. After a bit of celebrating with his team in the locker room, Kawhi gave us a little bit of true personality prior to a sit down interview with Kyle Lowry and ESPN's Rachel Nichols.


Serge Ibaka helped us out from there forward – Kawhi gave us the meme of the summer with, "What it do, babyyy!"


And his summer diet is relatable, too.


Thank you for being you, Kawhi. And Happy 28th Birthday, my man!

Author(s)
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Kyle Irving is an NBA content producer for The Sporting News.