HiJiNX wrote:PerfectJab wrote:HiJiNX wrote:The point is flying over your head. The point is that Toronto wasn’t seen as a legitimate franchise in an NBA sports cultural sense before Vince arrived and for some time after he left. I’m not sure why our fanbase keeps downplaying that. We are not at all grateful enough for Vince’s contributions to Toronto. Why? It has nothing to do with his play but how he left. And I hated it, too. But it’s been like 20 years. Time to move on and let it go.
Wtf are you talking about? Legitimate NBA sports team before Vince arrived? The team was literally in the league for only 3 seasons and didn't even have their stadium built yet. Vince made that happen? Ridiculous.
You are entitled to your own opinion but my opinion is that you have low standards when it comes to jersey retirements.
1x 2nd team
1x 3rd team
Top win season 45 wins
Top playoff 2nd round exit
Only 1 time in top 10 MVP voting (position 10)
Losing record throughout tenure
Not loyal
Jersey retirement requires at least one of these IMO:
loyalty to the team
A legitimate superstar in the league
A winner
His track record and accolades contradict all of these.
What do the aforementioned symbolize and why are they important? You use the jersey in the rafters as a way to represent something you want the current players to represent. What does he represent?
He did have loyalty to the team, the city, and the country. The management sucked. Richard Peddie was a notorious meddler. The media started to needlessly attack Vince for his injuries. And yet Vince has never once said anything bad about the city or the country, in fact it’s always been the opposite with him.
Vince was definitely a superstar. To say he wasn’t…either you are biased or weren’t old enough to experience the phenomenon. Again, Vince was arguably the most popular basketball player in the world at one point.
He wasn’t a winner? Which Raptors roster was he supposed to win with?
Again, there is nobody credible connected to the league—staff or player or media member, who would take any of these “he doesn’t deserve his jersey retired” arguments seriously. You’d literally get laughed at. These folks are able to properly contextualize things in a way bitter, narrow-minded, or uninformed fans simply can’t or won’t.
I would bet all of my money and assets that Vince is gonna get his jersey retired here. And when it happens he will deserve it, the fans will cheer, and the media will laud him. Because he actually was that important.
If you're referring to popularity then he was a superstar similar to what Kemp was. We obviously have different views as to what constitutes a superstar. To me it means the best players in the league which he never was. At his best he was around Paul Pierce's level. The superstars in that era were Garnett, Kobe, Shaq, Wade, Duncan and Nowitzki. He wasn't even close to any of those players.
Funny how these so called 'experts' that have credibility only voted him to 2 all NBA teams(Derozan who was without a doubt a better Raptor overall throughout his entire tenure did it 4 times, think about that) and he only cracked the top 10 in MVP voting once in his career in you guessed it, one of those 2 good seasons he had with the Raptors. Again, name one player that was a superstar that never hit top 5 in MVP voting at least once in their career.
Again I disagree that he will get his jersey retired because:
1. Wasn't good enough to make up for lack of below
2. Wasn't loyal to the team (How is admitting to not trying being loyal to the team? How is asking for a trade loyal?)
3. Wasn't a winner (With the Raps or any other team. You talk about his teammates and I'd argue he is not a winning player as one of the center pieces and his time with the Magic and Nets prove it. Problem has always been that he is a lazy player. He doesn't play on both sides of the floor and isn't incredibly efficient to make up for it which makes him a liability for the teams he plays for.
I don't think he will get his jersey retired because that would set the bar low but then again you never know when it comes to these sort of things.
Take away the flashy dunks he was above average not all that efficient and a 1 way player. Without a doubt the best dunker of all time but I don't think that deserves an award.
