The KD/Lebron era and why what we're doing is smart

[Double Helix]

I guarantee you that this team will earn more money next year, and have higher ratings, competing for the playoffs with Kyle, Rudy and Jonas over past tank years. It's easy for fans to say bring on the tank when they're not the ones shelling out thousands in seasons tickets.

Cable TV is a lot cheaper than those gold seats. Many didn't even tune in for some of the "rebuilding" games on TV. How can you expect Toronto's wealthy basketball fans to put down thousands in seats to watch the likes of D-leaguers during tank years? The game threads were much quieter back then. Now, we are seeing one hundred page game threads again. That tells you everything you need to know about why it makes sense to take a break from the lotto and then return to it when Rudy's contract ends and Lebron is pushing 32 years of age.

[SDM]

6-3 against good teams since we got Rudy Gay. Maybe that has something to do with the goodwill?

Welp. A nine game sample size has apparently convinced you "that our teams ceiling is as good as any going forward other then the select few with top 5 talents to build around".

Thanks for making my point even more clear, if it wasn't already. Just so, so easily placated. It's sad.

[DatBoiCapspace]

LOL. In a league where MORE THAN HALF the teams make the playoffs annually, only blind, beaten-down homers could accept 1 playoff appearance in 7 years as "disappointing underachievement". LOLOLOLOL.

Way to twist my words chump! And it was two playoff years btw.

But youre right we should be more like the Bobcats or SAC/WAS. Those guys know how to do a proper rebuild through the draft!

Sure, it's worst to be a fan of the Bobcats than it is to be a fan of the Raptors. But that doesn't mean that being a Raptors fan has been a particularly rewarding experience over the last 18 years. We've been a bottom 10 franchise for sure during our existence, in terms of success. You could easily make a case that we've been bottom 5. You shouldn't blame the fanbase for being fed up with incompetence, and wanting better than what we've gotten over the years.

- The most games we've ever won is 47 (we did that twice)
- We've won a playoff round one time
- We've only even made the playoffs 5 out of 17 times, and we're going for 5 out of 18

Not everyone is "championship or bust" when it comes to assessing Raptors moves, I'm certainly not. I just want to see progress towards a legitimately good team that has a long window of sustained success (for example, give me the Atlanta Hawks over same 18 year time period, and I wouldn't be nearly as negative about my team. The Hawks aren't even an elite franchise, they've just had some decent runs here and there).

I don't think that what we're doing right now is progress, I think it's more of the same doomed quick fix BS that we've seen for years. Of course, anyone is free to disagree with that, but that's my opinion and I think it has a good basis in what the Raptors management has done up to this point.

Expansion teams in a foreign market have faired much worse then us. I'd rather be a Raptors fan over lots of teams the past 15 years. And most of the hate cannot even be put on the organization but on star players reluctance to come here. You know how that changes? By building a winning cultur and opening peoples eyes to our market. Or else the next star we draft will probably bolt in FA first chance they get again. And for the last time, the Rudy Gay trade is not a treadmill move. If youre not championship or bust and youve seen the vast improvement its made so far, how can you not be optimistic for next season?

And lmao about wanting to be a hawks fan the past 18 years. You must not remember how terribly managed that team was for almost a decade of literally no success while passing up on star player after star player in the lottery for more forwards. Give me the VC years over a decade of boring forwards any day. Weve had some damn exciting players to watch from VC, TMAC, DD, Moon, Ross to guys like Mugsy Bogues, JYD. I dont even think Hawks fans would agree with you there, and if they dont score big this offseason itll most likely be more years of pain ahead for them.

[Left Side Drive]

We can try the Indiana Pacers route and try to compete every year and hope for the best while adding players through trades and draft (I believe the Pacers picked up Hibbert, Granger and George past the top 10).

The problem is we severely overpay for some of our more expendable players. Overpaying for 1st or 2nd option guys is okay but not for role players that you can ind inthe D-league or Europe somewhere.

Also, we need a coach with an identity and competence to be an actual head coach. Casey could be our lead assistant though.

[Snowcrash]

LOL Great post. I can't wrap my head around why some of the members on this board are still Raptor fans when they seem to hate almost everything theyve done the past decade lol.
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Yeah. Almost sounds like an abusive relationship. Don't know why they bother staying in it if it's killing them so much.

[DatBoiCapspace]

6-3 against good teams since we got Rudy Gay. Maybe that has something to do with the goodwill?

Welp. A nine game sample size has apparently convinced you "that our teams ceiling is as good as any going forward other then the select few with top 5 talents to build around".

Thanks for making my point even more clear, if it wasn't already. Just so, so easily placated. It's sad.

A two and a half season sample size post Bosh was enough to realize we were goign nowhere the next couple years without Gay. And the Lowry trade which im guessing you were for already ended the tank job, the Gay trade just makes our outlook much better so whats not to like? And you have a crystal ball then tell me which 15 teams are going to be better then us next two years, and why? Make a prediction on anything instead of bitch bitch bitch all the time.

[ATLTimekeeper]

I think now is the time to make a run in the East. There's only one team that stands above the rest, and one major injury knocks them out of contention. I was surprised that all those .600 teams didn't do anything to sieze the moment. Boston is 5.5 games back of the 2nd seed. Compare that to the West, where the 7th seed is 8.5 games back of Oklahoma City.

[vini_vidi_vici]

LOL Great post. I can't wrap my head around why some of the members on this board are still Raptor fans when they seem to hate almost everything theyve done the past decade lol.
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Yeah. Almost sounds like an abusive relationship. Don't know why they bother staying in it if it's killing them so much.

Ive endured far worse being a RedSox fan, but let me tell you, 04 made it all worthwhile.

Being a certain way (negative/positive) =/= being a fan. People are critical because they want better for a team they invest time into. The same goes for people who are positive, because they want to see the team be great like they expect. Its okay to have varying differences in opinion, and neither is right despite all the arguments and narratives. Now when people are indifferent or apathetic, thats when you should worry. Remember one thing, we are all hardcore fans who want one thing, building for a championship, some just have lesser expectations and thats not meant as an insult.

[Snowcrash]

6-3 against good teams since we got Rudy Gay. Maybe that has something to do with the goodwill?

Welp. A nine game sample size has apparently convinced you "that our teams ceiling is as good as any going forward other then the select few with top 5 talents to build around".

Thanks for making my point even more clear, if it wasn't already. Just so, so easily placated. It's sad.

You know what? For a lot of people, it's just entertainment, pure and simple. Like going to the movies. Give people a decent effort, occasionally stomp on a good team.. Nothing to do with being placated. That's what opiates are for.

[Geddy]

There is a difference between being a legitimate playoff threat and a lottery team. If you want us to be content with being a 7th-10th seed then I don't know what to say. There is nothing wrong with pushing for a better team as any team can go on a hot streak and knock off another good team in a 4 game series.

[niQ]

I agree with OP. This is just the generation we are currently in. It's like the Ewings, the Stocktons, Malones, the Reggie Millers, all great players, but were just unfortunate to be playing in an era of Jordan.

To be honest, there is actually hope in winning games now. Despite the percentages, we actually have a closer now. People are actually tuning into games to watch Rudy Gay. Instead of being negative nancys it's time for people to wake up and face reality. It is what it is. The moves have been made and we have Rudy Gay. We are 6-3 since acquiring Gay. We may end up 9th this season but you can look at this as a stepping stone to next season where we will be more competitive for the playoffs. We're not going to win a championship from tanking 2 seasons just like that. One step at a time man, at least make the playoffs first. We could use some excitment after the last few dreaded seasons.

[DatBoiCapspace]

LOL Great post. I can't wrap my head around why some of the members on this board are still Raptor fans when they seem to hate almost everything theyve done the past decade lol.
.

Yeah. Almost sounds like an abusive relationship. Don't know why they bother staying in it if it's killing them so much.

Ive endured far worse being a RedSox fan, but let me tell you, 04 made it all worthwhile.

Being a certain way (negative/positive) =/= being a fan. People are critical because they want better for a team they invest time into. The same goes for people who are positive, because they want to see the team be great like they expect. Its okay to have varying differences in opinion, and neither is right despite all the arguments and narratives. Now when people are indifferent or apathetic, thats when you should worry. Remember one thing, we are all hardcore fans who want one thing, building for a championship, some just have lesser expectations and thats not meant as an insult.

The difference is around these parts you actually get the sense that some people actually want to see the team fail so they can be proven right about their bs capspace, draft picks, analytics theories on how to build a team that has been shoved down our faces by bloggers the past decade.

[Double Helix]

Believe me, I understand that all posters all entitled to their opinions but the line between what fans in other cities say on this board in order to troll, and what supposedly legitimate fans say on this board, has become a fine line.

When you're booing the team...
When you hate the direction the team seems to be headed on for the next few years under Rudy Gay...
When you hate the coach...
When you hate our recent lotto picks...
When you're deliberately trying to ruin the fan experience of other fans who actually are excited about the basketball games they're watching...
When you're not buying tickets...
When you're not buying apparel...
When you're complaining about the logo and the colors and the floor design..
When you're not consistently watching games on TV...

What exactly makes you a fan again? Because you once were? Because you live here and long for a championship?

If a band you once liked no longer appealed to you any more and wasn't making albums that brought you joy are you still a fan of that band? Would you go to concerts and boo that band? Would you go to that band's most popular website and vent about what you hate about the music and why it sucks? I guess some of you would but most of those other "fans" would just tell you all to shut up, or label you a troll, or punch you out at the concert they're trying to enjoy that you're ruining.

At a certain point maybe you're not a fan and maybe the rest of us should start recognizing that you're not any different than the trolls from other teams who come here just to ruin the fun of others. At a certain point you're no different than they are. This is the Rudy Gay, Kyle Lowry and Jonas Valanciunas era in Toronto. If you guys hate it so much there are 29 other teams you can like and get excited about. You live in the present. This is the team. Rudy is under contract for 3 more years. If you don't like the service or entertainment value you're getting from any other business you would quit or stop supporting that business. You wouldn't hang out and complain and try to ruin the experience of those who didn't feel the same way.

There's nothing admirable about sticking by the Dino logo if you hate everything it stands for and are devoted only to complaining about everything that is happening within that organization to anyone who'll listen.

[notic101]

Pretty much what I've been saying for the last two years. There's no way we're going to be competing for anything in the next 5-7 years, unless of course another Tim Duncan emerges or Wiggins turns into a LeBron/KD hybrid and we draft both of them somehow. We have to build slowly like the Grizzlies did leading up to 2010.

They built internally and acquired an All Star talent in Z-bo (albeit an unwanted one at the time, which can be said of Gay for us now) through trade and Marc Gasol turned out to be a blessing in disguise during that Pau "robbery". They had already assembled very good to solid role players all around that core with Conley, Mayo, Arhtur and have now added Ed Davis and Jerryd Bayless.

Hopefully we can emulate their successes and surprise an aging contender (Heat/Thunder/Clippers) in their late year runs by surprise like the Grizz did the Spurs in 2011.

[J-Roc]

I understand the fear that these good players will always win, but the goal is to just be as good as you can be, and then you never know. Why not the Pacers the get out of the Eastern Conference?

[Totem]

What we're doing is smart, not how we're doing it.

I mean I look at this team now and see all the different ways it could have been better. We could have actually been a force. It's not like hindsight where you look back and say: 'you should have done that or this' but majority of the board at the time was vehement of the move.

Some of this stuff was common sense.

I mean you don't extend assets in hope that they play up to their contract.

You don't trade away draft picks like they're candy.

You don't sign role players to large contracts so you could stop a deal.

You always take BPA in a draft.

If we managed our assets better there's no doubt we could have had a better team.

[Alfred]

Welcome fans who apparently aren't fans of the Raptors as currently constructed. At what point are you no longer a fan of a team when you dislike most of the players on it, the GM, and the coach? There are 29 other teams with message boards, you know. Mind you, not many will win a championship over the next 5 years, but I thought you would have known that since you only think long-term? No? Well, I'm going to go out on a limb and predict that less than 4 different cities will win a championship over the next 5 years. How's that for long-term? I would probably bet on that if the odds made it tempting enough. 26 other cities will all have to settle for various other consolation prizes and goals. Why? You read the subject line. You know the answer to that. It's the start -- START -- of the Thunder/Heat rivalry. Two once in a generation talents are entering their prime years in different conferences and if the Jordan era taught us anything it's that players who are likely to be on a shortlist of the top 25 GOAT-level talents, during their prime years, in this sport, with these rules, can't and won't be stopped.

So, all this talk about how we only deal in band aid fixes and short-term planning are, quite frankly, hilarious to me. If you really view it as championship or bust then it's time to simply wait. Grantland has had articles on this very subject. Everyone else is simply pretending during this era. Many of you view the fans (or homers) of the team that support "mediocrity" with disdain because you feel that in your infinite wisdom you're a better long-term planner. You and only you know what has to happen to beat Lebron and KD. You could have tanked beautifully and hit 3 top 2 picks in a row and likely still wouldn't have the top end talent necessary to knock off either the Thunder or Heat as they enter their primes. Lebron and Durant really are that much better over 7 games. So, quit acting like there was a magic pill solution that we missed out on. Quit acting like simply putting forth one of the more competitive teams this city has seen since Bosh, or VC before that, is such a horrible thing for this franchise in this era. Fans are paying money to watch games at the ACC. You can only sell hope and mock drafts for so long.

The Raptors are a business. Businesses need to make money. Teams make money, build their brand, and reach out to new generations by fighting for the playoffs every once and awhile. Next season is that time. Hell, we'll probably even come close this year by season's end despite digging that huge hole. This is the reality of the situation for the NBA's only non-US team. We have to have treadmill seasons. It's part of being in the NBA. We will tank again but better to time the next rebuild around an in-prime Jonas Valanciunas and an aging Lebron/Wade/KD/Westbrook because it won't matter until then regardless. You want to think and talk about the long term and building a championship winner? Start there. Start 4-5 years from now because all this other armchair rebuilding talk is just as treadmill as the stuff most of you hate with those two teams sitting atop the NBA mountain.

So if we don't like how the team is being run, we're free to go cheer for another team on another forum. How generous of you!

Perhaps people would be more amenable to this whole "win now" approach, if the team was, you know, winning. As in having a positive record. It's not championship or bust for me, it's "have a good team". Since Bryan has taken over, we have had a good team ONCE. We had one season where we were an above average team. Since that first season, it's been a long, slow slide into the basement, with Colangelo flailing about wildly, making one poor move after another.

Colangelo started with a General Manager's wet dream: tons of capspace, the #1 pick in the draft, an All-Star bigman, and a couple of other assets. In 7 years he has turned that into NO capspace, NO pick, NO All-Star and still NO playoffs. That is a massive, massive failure, one that your post cannot handwave away.

[dTox]

Welcome fans who apparently aren't fans of the Raptors as currently constructed. At what point are you no longer a fan of a team when you dislike most of the players on it, the GM, and the coach? There are 29 other teams with message boards, you know. Mind you, not many will win a championship over the next 5 years, but I thought you would have known that since you only think long-term? No? Well, I'm going to go out on a limb and predict that less than 4 different cities will win a championship over the next 5 years. How's that for long-term? I would probably bet on that if the odds made it tempting enough. 26 other cities will all have to settle for various other consolation prizes and goals. Why? You read the subject line. You know the answer to that. It's the start -- START -- of the Thunder/Heat rivalry. Two once in a generation talents are entering their prime years in different conferences and if the Jordan era taught us anything it's that players who are likely to be on a shortlist of the top 25 GOAT-level talents, during their prime years, in this sport, with these rules, can't and won't be stopped.

So, all this talk about how we only deal in band aid fixes and short-term planning are, quite frankly, hilarious to me. If you really view it as championship or bust then it's time to simply wait. Grantland has had articles on this very subject. Everyone else is simply pretending during this era. Many of you view the fans (or homers) of the team that support "mediocrity" with disdain because you feel that in your infinite wisdom you're a better long-term planner. You and only you know what has to happen to beat Lebron and KD. You could have tanked beautifully and hit 3 top 2 picks in a row and likely still wouldn't have the top end talent necessary to knock off either the Thunder or Heat as they enter their primes. Lebron and Durant really are that much better over 7 games. So, quit acting like there was a magic pill solution that we missed out on. Quit acting like simply putting forth one of the more competitive teams this city has seen since Bosh, or VC before that, is such a horrible thing for this franchise in this era. Fans are paying money to watch games at the ACC. You can only sell hope and mock drafts for so long.

The Raptors are a business. Businesses need to make money. Teams make money, build their brand, and reach out to new generations by fighting for the playoffs every once and awhile. Next season is that time. Hell, we'll probably even come close this year by season's end despite digging that huge hole. This is the reality of the situation for the NBA's only non-US team. We have to have treadmill seasons. It's part of being in the NBA. We will tank again but better to time the next rebuild around an in-prime Jonas Valanciunas and an aging Lebron/Wade/KD/Westbrook because it won't matter until then regardless. You want to think and talk about the long term and building a championship winner? Start there. Start 4-5 years from now because all this other armchair rebuilding talk is just as treadmill as the stuff most of you hate with those two teams sitting atop the NBA mountain.

So if we don't like how the team is being run, we're free to go cheer for another team on another forum. How generous of you!

Perhaps people would be more amenable to this whole "win now" approach, if the team was, you know, winning. As in having a positive record. It's not championship or bust for me, it's "have a good team". Since Bryan has taken over, we have had a good team ONCE. We had one season where we were an above average team. Since that first season, it's been a long, slow slide into the basement, with Colangelo flailing about wildly, making one poor move after another.

Colangelo started with a General Manager's wet dream: tons of capspace, the #1 pick in the draft, an All-Star bigman, and a couple of other assets. In 7 years he has turned that into NO capspace, NO pick, NO All-Star and still NO playoffs. That is a massive, massive failure, one that your post cannot handwave away.

Well said, and it certainly doesn't disqualify us as "fans" for not being happy with most of what Bryan has laid out for us this year (i.e. coach, gay, extensions, draft picks)...because the last time I checked, I was a Toronto fan before Bryan was here and along with his aquisitions, and I will be here even after they leave, thats why I'm a fan.

[sanity]

No offense but we haven't sniffed mediocrity (look at the 76ers/Hawks/Utahs records in the last 5-6 years compared to ours) so the idea that fans would be upset at that irregardless of the reality that we've been bad for the last decade anyway... is pretty dim logic. At some point results have to matter and be emphasized, so telling some fans who try to hold some standards to their team by what they see other teams doing is wrong or that they are not true fans tells more about the lack of support you have for a winning product than the fans who bitch and whine all day about a failed product.

[Double Helix]

All I'm saying is that everyone has a choice and needs to ask themselves why they still consider themselves a Toronto Raptors fan. Why do you watch? If you aren't technically supporting the team then what makes you a supporter?

In the English Premier League, only Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea, Aresenal, or Liverpool, ever really stand a chance at winning. In fact, if you look at the past champions almost all of them are from one of those teams.

The other fans know they likely won't win the whole thing every time the season begins but they still cheer the team on and can separate the differences from the top clubs and where they're at and find enjoyment in smaller victories and the matches themselves. That's admirable. That's support.

Trolling every positive fan-related post about a player doesn't seem like support to me. How is that any different than me going to the Bobcats board and writing about the inefficiency of Kemba Walker, or how MKG isn't good enough to take them to the next level, or how the team sucks and how their jerseys suck and how their GM and ownership sucks? Proximity to the city of Charlotte? At what point is a troll a troll? Where he's from?