Bruce Brown Shares the Price Of His Raptors Jersey Number

Bruce Brown said he paid Jontay Porter $10,000 for his Toronto Raptors jersey No. 11 following his trade from Indiana

Jontay Porter was too kind.

That’s been the word on Porter since he first joined the Toronto Raptors organization earlier this year. Anyone who talks to him comes away impressed. He’s smart, articulate, and by all accounts a good guy. His only flaw, it seems, is he’s not greedy enough.

It was too easy for Bruce Brown Jr. to take Porter’s number following Brown’s trade to the Raptors earlier this week. Brown said he’d never worn any of the numbers available to newly acquired Raptors players and wanted to stick with his old No. 11.

Brown said he’d been talking to Michael Porter Jr., Jontay’s older brother who Brown played with on the Nuggets, and there was a discussion about potentially swapping jerseys.

The fee?

$10,000, Brown said.

“Honestly, I thought he was going to ask for more,” Brown said with a smirk. “I gave him 10. He said yes, and I said, 'Cool.'”

For some context, Brown is set to earn $22 million this year, $23 million next year, and so far, has career earnings over $37 million. Porter, conversely, will make less than $1 million this year on a two-way contract with no guarantee for any future earnings and with a relatively easily $2.4 million in career earnings to his name.

Having the old numbers is may be the only familiarity Brown has had over the past couple of days since he arrived in Toronto alongside Jordan Nwora while the Pacers had been in Sacramento.

“Kind of crazy,” Brown said of the past few days. “We were about to go practice. So I had to take my stuff off, go to my room, pack up. Fly Indy last night. Got in and, I think, like 1 (am). And then I had a fight this morning.”

Brown said he didn’t know if he was going to play Thursday but with the league having cleared the deal, he suited up and gave Toronto 25 minutes off the bench, scoring 15 points on 7-for-10 shooting.

“I don't know any of the plays. I don't know much,” Brown said post-game. "So I was just kind of trying to be in the right spots, trying to make an imprint on the game on the defensive end, trying to get some skills.”