Pascal is on the brink of SUPERSTARDOM...

[Live Free]

That doesn't answer my question.

Yeah he was the best player on the court in the Nets series bucks series and heat series.. Whats your point?

Anyways stop givin asscal passes were here talking about asking him to get out of the measly first round. The guys you've named have all lead their teams to the finals.

Wow, this is unbelievable. Let me get this straight, are you saying that Tatum was better than Giannis in the Bucks series? And he was better than Butler in the Heat series?

Yeah, he won. Giannis percentages were terrible in the celtics series and if butler wasn't putting up 40 he was giving you 7pts.. both lost.

I don't even think Tatum is elite tbh

[Los_29]

Yeah he was the best player on the court in the Nets series bucks series and heat series.. Whats your point?

Anyways stop givin asscal passes were here talking about asking him to get out of the measly first round. The guys you've named have all lead their teams to the finals.

Wow, this is unbelievable. Let me get this straight, are you saying that Tatum was better than Giannis in the Bucks series? And he was better than Butler in the Heat series?

Yeah, he won. Giannis percentages were terrible in the celtics series and if butler wasn't putting up 40 he was giving you 7pts.. both lost.

Yeah I think we're done. You're clearly not willing to be objective here. Tatum was absolutely not better than Giannis or Butler in those series. Tatum went 7 games with both those teams despite him having a much superior supporting cast. Giannis and Butler were carrying their teams while Tatum had Brown put up 22-24ppg on better percentages. Butler was playing with a 36 year old Lowry and Max Strus. Giannis had to pass to guys like Pat Connaughton and Grayson Allen. Tatum wasn't better than those guys. If he was those series would've ended a lot sooner.

Is Jaylen Brown better than KD as well?

[ForeverTFC]

What's amazing is that he's doing this with not the best spacing.

[anotherhomer]

If Pascal makes all-nba he is eligible for the super max.. which is 35% of the cap. So even if Pascal ends up having a tremendous season.. he's going to get ripped apart by Raptor fans eventually again.

35% of the cap in 2024 (for an estimated $136M salary cap) with 8% raises could be about $53.5M per year of a 4 year contract extension or about $55M per year of a 5 year contract extension.

Super stardom has a price

It's not a bad problem to have

[refshateRaps]

The new Demar

[Spates]

The new Demar

Bold statement. You're gonna get eaten alive.

[SFour]

Siakam is a great player...we won a championship with him as the #2 scorer....I don't see him taking us to a chip as the #1 guy, we need a superstar in front of him again.

That's not a diss against Siakam....look at PG, AD, Embiid, Kyrie....all these guys have another go-to guy in Kawhi, Lebron, Harden, KD....Siakam needs that as well.

[Live Free]

Wow, this is unbelievable. Let me get this straight, are you saying that Tatum was better than Giannis in the Bucks series? And he was better than Butler in the Heat series?

Yeah, he won. Giannis percentages were terrible in the celtics series and if butler wasn't putting up 40 he was giving you 7pts.. both lost.

Yeah I think we're done. You're clearly not willing to be objective here. Tatum was absolutely not better than Giannis or Butler in those series. Tatum went 7 games with both those teams despite him having a much superior supporting cast. Giannis and Butler were carrying their teams while Tatum had Brown put up 22-24ppg on better percentages. Butler was playing with a 36 year old Lowry and Max Strus. Giannis had to pass to guys like Pat Connaughton and Grayson Allen. Tatum wasn't better than those guys. If he was those series would've ended a lot sooner.

Is Jaylen Brown better than KD as well?

Lol that Miami supporting cast with bam Lowry Herro tucker was good enough for 1st in the East and a 3pter away from the finals for Jimmy..

Giannis was missing Middleton... he didn't have the best series but he definitely would have been the best player on the court and most likely gotten to the finals.

Pascal isn't in that league yet until he proves it.. I don't get what you're missing. Our ceiling is the 2nd round at most right now lol

[planetmars]

If Pascal makes all-nba he is eligible for the super max.. which is 35% of the cap. So even if Pascal ends up having a tremendous season.. he's going to get ripped apart by Raptor fans eventually again.

35% of the cap in 2024 (for an estimated $136M salary cap) with 8% raises could be about $53.5M per year of a 4 year contract extension or about $55M per year of a 5 year contract extension.

Super stardom has a price

It's not a bad problem to have

It sort of is an issue in my opinion. Him having a great season this season is great for this season. But can hurt us for future seasons if his play drops. It can put a hamper on what the team can spend on if they want to keep ducking the tax. If he becomes inconsistent or gets hurt, we could have a Beal/Wall/Westbrook type of situation on our hands. They all had super max contracts too.

Maybe Pascal takes a pay cut, and doesn't go for the max. He did however get a rookie max extension, and it was more than 25% since he made the all-nba team then too. I'm sure his agent would be wanting that super max if he was qualified for it.

[Los_29]

Yeah, he won. Giannis percentages were terrible in the celtics series and if butler wasn't putting up 40 he was giving you 7pts.. both lost.

Yeah I think we're done. You're clearly not willing to be objective here. Tatum was absolutely not better than Giannis or Butler in those series. Tatum went 7 games with both those teams despite him having a much superior supporting cast. Giannis and Butler were carrying their teams while Tatum had Brown put up 22-24ppg on better percentages. Butler was playing with a 36 year old Lowry and Max Strus. Giannis had to pass to guys like Pat Connaughton and Grayson Allen. Tatum wasn't better than those guys. If he was those series would've ended a lot sooner.

Is Jaylen Brown better than KD as well?

Lol that Miami supporting cast with bam Lowry Herro tucker was good enough for 1st in the East and a 3pter away from the finals for Jimmy..

Giannis was missing Middleton... he didn't have the best series but he definitely would have been the best player on the court and most likely gotten to the finals.

Pascal isn't in that league yet until he proves it.. I don't get what you're missing. Our ceiling is the 2nd round at most right now lol

Why are you bringing up regular season success? You literally said it didn't matter in a previous post in this very thread. Herro played 4 games in that series and Lowry missed time as well. Heat were completely outmatched in that series and Butler single-handedly took that series to 7 games. He was absolutely the best player in that series especially when you look at all the advanced metrics.

35/15/6 with elite defense makes you the best player in the series.

And 2nd round ceiling this year is fine with me. This team isn't a finished product. We have a young team and just a year ago we were in the lottery. We've made some big strides in a short period of time. And I'm questioning your rationale and you haven't been able to support it in anyway. People need to make these blanket statements. LOL.

[ruckus]

What doesn't make sense to me is particular segments of the fanbase continually asking Pascal to "prove it". How often does he need to exceed expectations to get some benefit of the doubt?

[AbC?]

I honestly think there's a contingent of our fanbase that was so emotionally damaged by Pascal's bubble performance that they just can't move on from that. People were stuck in their homes, it was peak covid lockdown time, bad time for mental health in general and Pascal made them feel negative emotions. Everything he's done since is marred by that time. Sad.

Anyways he's one of my favorite players ever to watch. Pure, ethical hooper.

[Los_29]

I honestly think there's a contingent of our fanbase that was so emotionally damaged by Pascal's bubble performance that they just can't move on from that. People were stuck in their homes, it was peak covid lockdown time, bad time for mental health in general and Pascal made them feel negative emotions. Everything he's done since is marred by that time. Sad.

Anyways he's one of my favorite players ever to watch. Pure, ethical hooper.

He's brilliant. Can't believe how much his game has evolved.

[bluerap23]

The new Demar

Worst take on the board.

Elite defence, playoff performance, even the 3 is superior to DeMar.

[And1+2]

Pascal is insane. Imagine if Kawhi stayed, we would be on the brink of a 4-peat.

[Gold Dragon]

If Pascal makes all-nba he is eligible for the super max.. which is 35% of the cap. So even if Pascal ends up having a tremendous season.. he's going to get ripped apart by Raptor fans eventually again.

35% of the cap in 2024 (for an estimated $136M salary cap) with 8% raises could be about $53.5M per year of a 4 year contract extension or about $55M per year of a 5 year contract extension.

Super stardom has a price

It's not a bad problem to have

It sort of is an issue in my opinion. Him having a great season this season is great for this season. But can hurt us for future seasons if his play drops. It can put a hamper on what the team can spend on if they want to keep ducking the tax. If he becomes inconsistent or gets hurt, we could have a Beal/Wall/Westbrook type of situation on our hands. They all had super max contracts too.

Maybe Pascal takes a pay cut, and doesn't go for the max. He did however get a rookie max extension, and it was more than 25% since he made the all-nba team then too. I'm sure his agent would be wanting that super max if he was qualified for it.

You get one of those rare consistently performing all nba level players carrying your team and you want them to resign at a discount because they MIGHT drop off in the future? That is a great way to not only lose pascal in free agency but anyone else who tastes success on the raptors.

[planetmars]

It's not a bad problem to have

It sort of is an issue in my opinion. Him having a great season this season is great for this season. But can hurt us for future seasons if his play drops. It can put a hamper on what the team can spend on if they want to keep ducking the tax. If he becomes inconsistent or gets hurt, we could have a Beal/Wall/Westbrook type of situation on our hands. They all had super max contracts too.

Maybe Pascal takes a pay cut, and doesn't go for the max. He did however get a rookie max extension, and it was more than 25% since he made the all-nba team then too. I'm sure his agent would be wanting that super max if he was qualified for it.

You get one of those rare consistently performing all nba level players carrying your team and you want them to resign at a discount because they MIGHT drop off in the future? That is a great way to not only lose pascal in free agency but anyone else who tastes success on the raptors.

The key point is consistency. There was a point where Russ, Wall and Beal were consistent as well. As soon as that consistency drops that contract becomes a noose. The super max is the worst contract in the NBA and should only be given to true super stars. Maybe that's Pascal but that's a risk in my opinion. He'll likely get it either way since that's how things work in the NBA. Players have most of the power in this league.

If he maintains that consistency even under a super max contract.. it's great for us, but still sucky that we have to spend 35% of the cap on one guy. Makes it tough to work around, especially when the owner of the team hates paying the tax.

[kalel123]

I feel it's a waste of time and energy to discuss this here and now. Because we all know what he can do in regular season. Year-to-year improvement is good for sure but it'll be all-for-nothing if he shrinks again in the playoffs when games matter the most. He showed some signs of life last season but was too little too late then and certainly not enough to be out of the woods yet. Need to show real improvements in the playoffs but long time from now till then so don't want to get overexcited over what could be much of nothing.

[Feyz]

He would have to become undeniable and lead this team to a top 4 seed to even get noticed by the big NBA media outlets.

[Gold Dragon]

It sort of is an issue in my opinion. Him having a great season this season is great for this season. But can hurt us for future seasons if his play drops. It can put a hamper on what the team can spend on if they want to keep ducking the tax. If he becomes inconsistent or gets hurt, we could have a Beal/Wall/Westbrook type of situation on our hands. They all had super max contracts too.

Maybe Pascal takes a pay cut, and doesn't go for the max. He did however get a rookie max extension, and it was more than 25% since he made the all-nba team then too. I'm sure his agent would be wanting that super max if he was qualified for it.

You get one of those rare consistently performing all nba level players carrying your team and you want them to resign at a discount because they MIGHT drop off in the future? That is a great way to not only lose pascal in free agency but anyone else who tastes success on the raptors.

The key point is consistency. There was a point where Russ, Wall and Beal were consistent as well. As soon as that consistency drops that contract becomes a noose. The super max is the worst contract in the NBA and should only be given to true super stars. Maybe that's Pascal but that's a risk in my opinion. He'll likely get it either way since that's how things work in the NBA. Players have most of the power in this league.

If he maintains that consistency even under a super max contract.. it's great for us, but still sucky that we have to spend 35% of the cap on one guy. Makes it tough to work around, especially when the owner of the team hates paying the tax.

This team will be operating as an above the cap team for probably the next decade and the largest free agent we will be able to afford is the MLE or tax MLE depending on whether we are a tax team or not. Whether pascal gets 40M or 45M will have no bearing on what we can afford in free agency. It will have a bearing on whether we can afford our own free agents if we are not a contending team worthy of paying the tax for. But we won’t be a contending team worthy of paying the tax if we lose our best players nickel and diming them.