The real MVP.

A year later there is no disputing which single player was most responsible for leading the Toronto Raptors to their first NBA title.

He was the Finals MVP and he plays for the Los Angeles Clippers now after a 12-month stint north of the border that will be forever legendary.

From his on-court production to the catalogue quirky quotes, Kawhi Leonard’s time as a Raptor was brief but almost impossibly impactful.

But on the anniversary of the Raptors championship, it might be worth putting Kyle Lowry’s contribution in a fuller context and recognizing the single player most responsible for turning the Raptors into a championship organization.

“He knows everything that is going on around him. Every single thing,” is Raptors president Masai Ujiri’s scouting report on his longest-serving player. “And he just handles himself really, really well.”

Lowry got it done on the floor this time last year.

The Raptors title was a validation that shouldn’t have been necessary. But putting a ring on a player whose game is more about contributions that aren’t as easily captured by stats – unless you’re into the league’s ‘charges drawn’ leaders – provides a useful shorthand to swat away uninformed opinions with.

But in the context of the nearly three weeks of social unrest that has brought the United States and other countries to a potential reckoning on social and racial injustices, Lowry’s off-court contributions from a year ago deserve more discussion.

Two moments, in particular, stand out as Lowry was able to defuse tense and even racially charged moments and come out looking like the better man.

The first came in early in the fourth quarter of Game 3 at Oracle Arena in a win that signaled the Raptors weren’t just happy to be in their first Finals, but that they were there to be heard.

Lowry dives hard into the first row to save a ball headed out of bounds and ends up in the lap of a fan – another signature Lowry play. But before he can get back to the floor another fan pushes Lowry and yells at the Raptors star.

Lowry, agitated but cool in the moment, motions for the referees to intervene and minutes later the fan is escorted out of the building.

The punchline? The fan was Mark Stevens, a multibillionaire investor and part of the Warriors ownership group. He was eventually fined $500,000 and suspended by the NBA for a year.

But viewed in hindsight, the most interesting thing about the incident was what Lowry said the next day when asked about Stevens, who reportedly told him to “Go f— yourself” multiple times after shoving him.

“He showed his true colors at the time.”

And Lowry showed his too. While acknowledging he was furious about being hit and cursed for doing his job – and by a white owner with ties to the Republican party in Donald Trump’s America, no less – he was able to keep his composure.

How?

“By understanding at the moment my team needed me. Understanding that there are plenty of fans and kids in the world watching this game. Me being a grown man, having kids myself. I’m a grown man and my kids could always go back and see that,” Lowry said.

“If it wasn’t in this situation, things may have been — they probably would have been done differently, handled differently by me. But understanding that I have two young children and being able to hold myself to a certain standard, which I do, I hold myself to a high, high standard. And I have to make sure that I uphold that.

“That’s a big thing for me … never letting guys like him get under your skin because that’s bull crap.”

It’s fair to say that the Raptors storybook season would have had a much different ending had Lowry lost his temper or decided to respond to Stevens in kind with a shove or worse. A player hitting a fan – even if provoked – is something that would drown a suspension and likely altered the course of the series.

But Lowry wasn’t finished making big plays at key moments.

Source 1: Toronto Raptors Schedule

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Source 3: Denver Nuggets Schedule