Only Klay Thompson Can Stop Kawhi Leonard From Making History

While Klay Thompson's sharpshooting is and will always be his calling card, his perimeter defense generally gets overlooked. One of the best perimeter defenders in the league, Klay's defense is essential if the Golden State Warriors want to pull off a comeback for the ages against Kawhi Leonard and the Toronto Raptors without Kevin Durant.

While Leonard has been averaging 29.8 points on 43 percent shooting in this series, those numbers are noticeably worse when he's guarded by Thompson, as Leonard shoots just 36 percent when guarded by KT. In Game 5, Kawhi was guarded by Thompson on 22 possessions, but racked up only four points.

While Toronto usually scores 113.7 points per 100 possessions, they can only manage a paltry 98.8 when Klay is guarding Kawhi. For context, that 98.8 is lower than the 100.0 points per 100 the Boston Celtics scored during their lowly playoff run.

The Warriors and Raptors are both smart teams and have both likely figured out Klay has been Kawhi's kryptonite in this series. If the Raptors supplementary pieces in Pascal Siakam and Kyle Lowry can't step up and take some of the responsibility off of Leonard, a Warriors comeback isn't out of the cards just yet.