Derozan interview on ESPN, Tues 10pm EST (TONIGHT!)

[Concernedcad]

I hope we ship out Lowrys bum ass too. Entitled ****.

[hsb]

You Toronto people really feel victimized for no reason.

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Torontonians have a maddening inferiority complex man.

This city is wayyyy too diverse to act like we think homogeneously like that. Just saying.

[vjkid]

I don't think people should turn on him for this tbh. Its pretty normal for players to be mad at management when they get traded, especially when they didn't want to be traded

But it shouldn't be "normal". Again, be professional since you're working for a professional business. Masai did what hes paid for and brought in a better player on accolades alone. Masai is supposed to make the team better, not do what Derozan wants. He can be mad and frustrated behind closed doors, wouldn't hold it against him, but once he goes public, gloves are off.

I expected more from Derozan the man. Im very disappointed. I wouldn't boo him myself, but i wouldn't blame others if they did. Have some appreciation for the millions of dollars you get paid to do something you love.

This has been Derozan's M.O. since he was drafted. Loyalty.

I can't understand how any of you are shocked by this or expected something different.

There’s a difference between gratitude, professionalism, and respect. Sorry, but to say that DeMar owes anyone in Toronto an apology is absolutely ludacris. He could have left and gotten the same or better deal in the states with lower taxes and playing closer to home. He’s the main reason why we have Kawhi.

I hate this celebrity/star bias of because he’s a professional athlete and gets paid millions of dollars, they should just accept everything that happens and move on. It’s the market rate, he’s worked that hard and that’s what the league is or was willing to pay for DeMar and other star athletes.

There’s a difference in corporations when they go through layoffs and handle it well vs those who don’t. If you inform employees strategically but respectfully and help them find new jobs, in comparison to pulling them into an office and handing them a piece of paper with terms and conditions of the severance and walking them out with a security, it makes a big difference on brand reputation. Normal people are allowed to complain when something like this happens, but for some reason athletes aren’t apparently.

Also, if you haven’t seen his Instagram post he is clearly grateful to the city and fans. He is clearly just upset with how it was handled and the professionalism and respect shown to him by MLSE and Masai.

Masai had a terrible apology where he backhanded it to him saying he traded him because he didn’t think he was good enough to help the Raptors win a championship and it’s not his job to care about DeMar.

[VinBaker6]

You Toronto people really feel victimized for no reason.

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Torontonians have a maddening inferiority complex man.

This city is wayyyy too diverse to act like we think homogeneously like that. Just saying.

You're probably right. I'm an outsider

[JRsmithereens]

I, however, have not a clue what homogeneous means, nor will I Google it.

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[Courtside]

You Toronto people really feel victimized for no reason.

Torontonians have a maddening inferiority complex man.

Wow, the irony here is unreal.

The inferiority complex among some of the fanbase is what makes them want to keep a player out of loyalty, rather than for basketball reasons. "He's the first star who wanted to stay, so we have to keep him" is exactly the kind of thinking that comes from an inferiority complex.

[Mr_NC]

Maaan what an interview, those emotions tho. I don’t care what this bipolar board says I feel for the guy and I’m always going to cheer him on. He could have dragged Masai through the mud but he answered it pretty good I think. Always class from Mr. I am Toronto. Can’t wait to see what he brings to the Spurs this season.

#ProveEm

[LoveMyRaps]

F*** Chris Haynes.

[AbC?]

Drake's a good guy hung out with DD for a couple hours to soften the blow. This forum takes him for granted.

[NBJ13]

Wow he went to Drake's house the day it came out, i didn't even really think he liked him like that

[tdotrep2]

man was gonna tear up a bit at points

[nabbs]

Demar’s an opportunistic all star

[VinBaker6]

You Toronto people really feel victimized for no reason.

Torontonians have a maddening inferiority complex man.

Wow, the irony here is unreal.

The inferiority complex among some of the fanbase is what makes them want to keep a player out of loyalty, rather than for basketball reasons. "He's the first star who wanted to stay, so we have to keep him" is exactly the kind of thinking that comes from an inferiority complex.

Sure. It also works the other way too where we bash every player who leaves. We bashed TJ Ford for God's sake lol.

Works both ways

[Cyrus]

Pretty good read, even with haynes trying to stir up stuff for the clicks/views. Demar did feel like Masai did him wrong (rightly or wrongly), and attacked his character a bit from the misunderstanding. But the other things about how he felt about Canada, Toronto, the city, it's nice to hear and why he felt heart broken about leaving, especially when like 15 years ago you hear things like from Doug Christie, wack stuff like "oh I'm glad I'm out the city, the food doesn't even taste the same", or some b/s stuff like that.

http://kwese.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/24184139/demar-derozan-dishes-trade-toronto-raptors-san-antonio-spurs-nba

[E-TRAK]

Love you demar. Nothing but respect.

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[OAKLEY_2]

Ok just going to say this. As a Raptor fan. Demar is like family! Always will be.

[Cyrus]

Torontonians have a maddening inferiority complex man.

Wow, the irony here is unreal.

The inferiority complex among some of the fanbase is what makes them want to keep a player out of loyalty, rather than for basketball reasons. "He's the first star who wanted to stay, so we have to keep him" is exactly the kind of thinking that comes from an inferiority complex.

Sure. It also works the other way too where we bash ever player we leaves. We bashed TJ Ford for God's sake lol.

Works both ways

I'm sure when Kawhi leaves next year, we'll go to back to bashing Masai and Kawhi as well (I won't) but i'm sure there will bunch of posters who will.

Just 2 months ago, the narrative was, when is masai going to finish "evaluating", forever evaluating, too firing the most wins coach the raptors have ever had, and this core can't get it done.

[Volcano]

Doing your job, especially if you have one of the highest salaries in the world, is never a sacrifice. He's exchanging his services for money. If he did give up a few million in his contract, he should have written in a trade kicker or something..he can blame his agent and himself for that. It could be that Ujiri negotiated a few mill less than the maximum possible as well since DD didn't really give a direct answer in the interview.

I think the problem here is more DD's lack of intelligence than his emotions. Of course, he has every right to not like this trade, but thinking that he should be notified in advance or thinking that he was good enough is presumptuous of him. He needs to look at it from an outside perspective, not just his own.

The inferiority complex and "Canadian" factor is played up by both fans and the media. Because of that, people think the Raps should just be grateful for any dogsh-t that comes our way. We lost Tmac, VC, Bosh (latter two due to being a losing team). Orlando lost Tmac, Shaq, Dwight. Cleveland lost Irving and Lebron twice despite having success. KG, Love wanted out of Minny and Butler might want out now too. I don't hear the same narratives with other teams though, I wonder why.

[Semanticist]

Again, it's really hard to shake the feeling that there isn't this sense amongst the players that being loyal to Toronto somehow represents this huge sacrifice. Because, you know, it's Canada. And it's cold … or something (a quick weather check will yield the shocking realization that two of the NBA's largest markets--NYC and BOS--have eerily similar climates to Toronto).

The reality is that with the management we have in place and with each passing (winning) season, we are quickly becoming one of the better organizations in the league, in one of the top cities in not only the league but the world (we are consistently ranked this way). I doubt very much that Kawhi will stay beyond this season, but I don't think that is an indictment of Toronto so much as it an endorsement of LA.

I have been a Raptors fan for eons, and this is easily the most excited I have been for the start of a season. If we had maintained the status quo … suffice it to say it was going to be really hard to get too emotionally invested in our fortunes again. I think many of us had lost faith that Masai was cutthroat enough to make the bold move, in particular to jettison the two obvious weak links. Most, including myself, understood that doing so would likely require a full rebuild but felt it was prudent given the circumstances, and were willing to endure some ineptitude in order to hopefully one day come back with a core actually capable of winning a championship. That Masai was able to somehow catapult us into immediate championship contention for a season or more, whilst simultaneously accelerating a necessary rebuild as a worst case scenario … is a mindboggling achievement to say the least.

Masai has entered his final form and is now completely unburdened by the millstones of "loyalty" and the like. Combine this with his already otherworldly asset management/maximization and eye for talent and we have one of the few GMs in the league (errr, by definition) comfortably occupying the high percentile tail of the normal distribution.

Notwithstanding the current sour grapes ugliness, I have always liked DeMar the person and have always respected DeMar the professional. But, sadly, he was always miscast as a superstar and even as our best player (which has always been Lowry). For as much heat as Bosh took as our #1, he was actually better suited to that role than DeRozan (he was more efficient, could therefore be effective at different usage levels, and was a plus defender).

I have already discussed at length why I think Masai was completely justified in navigating the trade as he did, and my opinion of that has only solidified as new information continues to leak out. In any case, the trade has been made and notwithstanding any minor infelicities on the part of Masai and the organization (and I emphasize minor), it's time for everyone to move on. Go Raps!

[OAKLEY_2]

Pretty good read, even with haynes trying to stir up stuff for the clicks/views. Demar did feel like Masai did he him wrong, and attacked his character a bit from the misunderstanding. But the other things about how he felt about Canada, Toronto, the city, it's nice to hear and why he felt heart broken about leaving, especially when like 15 years ago you hear things like from Doug Christie, wack stuff like oh glad I'm out the city, the food doesn't even taste the same, or some b/s stuff like that.

http://kwese.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/24184139/demar-derozan-dishes-trade-toronto-raptors-san-antonio-spurs-nba

Doug C hristie. What a bum!