Anunoby pranked Lillard with ‘Welcome to Toronto’ text before trade

O.G. Anunoby tried to trick Damian Lillard into thinking he was heading to Toronto before his trade from the Portland Trail Blazers to the Milwaukee Bucks was finalized.

In an interview with Bleacher Report’s Chris Haynes, Lillard revealed that Anunoby jokingly texted him and welcomed him to the Raptors in the days before the trade.

“Everything was up in the air and I was on the phone and I just got a random text from O.G., like, ‘Welcome to Toronto,'” Lillard recalled.

Lillard said Anunoby, with whom he trains in the summer, often jokes around when they’re together, so he decided to call the Raptors forward to find out if he was telling the truth.

“I finally called him, he didn’t answer, then he called me back, he was laughing,” Lillard said. “I was like, ‘Okay.’ It just caught me off guard, I know it didn’t happen like that.”

The Raptors were rumored to be among the front-runners for Lillard, though president Masai Ujiri told reporters on Monday that Toronto’s interest in the 33-year-old was “sensationalized.”

Lillard was traded to the Bucks last month after 11 seasons with the Trail Blazers.

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