Fred VanVleet landed his first mammoth NBA contract last week when he agreed to a new four-year deal with the Toronto Raptors, and the star guard is hoping the media doesn’t start treating him differently now.
VanVleet discussed his four-year, $85 million contract with reporters on Tuesday. In addition to thanking all the usual suspects, he also thanked the media for treating him fairly over the past several seasons. The 26-year-old wants to make sure that isn’t going to change just because he’s making more than $20 million per year now.
“I wanna give thanks to you ugly media people who have treated me pretty good over the last 4 years,” Vanvleet said, via TSN’s Josh Lewenberg. “Now that I’ve got a nice big contract don’t start s—-ing on me.”
Fortunately for VanVleet, the Toronto media market is not exactly known for being ferocious. Unless his game goes completely in the toilet, we doubt VanVleet is going to face a whole lot of scrutiny.
VanVleet had a breakout season last year after the Raptors lost Kawhi Leonard in free agency. He averaged career-highs across the board, highlighted by his 17.6 points and 6.6 assists per game. VanVleet made it clear that he wanted to be valued in free agency, and the Raptors gave him what he was looking for. Time will tell if the media is going to do the same.
