Roster is a mess - missed draft picks are part of reason

[YogurtProducer]

Idk if you are trolling or just that dense....You do realize Spurs did infact TANK and won by drafting a future dynasty....That is success and ideal for any franchise....Do you advocate for us to continue to try and be a play in team with a DeRozan/Aldridge style of team for 5 more years till 2030 and hope for different results than what we have been getting for 5 years now already?....If so than idk what to tell you but you should just become a fan of a different sport because Raptors will do absolutly nothing in the near future with the mindset you have. Spurs were doing it and pivoted like any smart franchise would do because they knew they were headed no where....The problem is people like you and people who think like you and franchises that think like you end up having years and years of a bad basketball product....Spurs switched it up and now are looking great...

I think its pretty obvious to majority of Raptor fans that this team needs new talent brand new top end talent and where do you find that? We are not making a magic trade for Giannis to save us this time lol....

When they had a real choice between competing and tanking they choose competing. Hence trading for derozan and holding onto him for 3 years until he was 32 while Gay and Aldridge aged out.

The year before the tank Spurs were a 34 win team and only had to get rid of Murray to bottom out. Raptors were coming off a 48 win season and would have had to get rid of multiple contributors to bottom out. Those situations were not remotely similar.

We are not remotely like those derozan/Aldridge spurs because of age, prospects and assets. It's a terrible strawman, are you advocating us becoming the Charlotte Hornets with multiple 20 win season in the least few years with nothing to show for it?

The Spurs were a play-in team the previous two seasons before 2022/2023. They let go of Derozan, Aldridge, Rudy Gay, and some vets and won 1 more game the following season even after they traded Derrick that same season. Dejounte Murray was coming off an allstar season when they traded him for peanuts. To say they weren’t purposely tanking is inaccurate because they did everything they could to be bad including trading Poeltl to us for a steal in the 2023 season.

By contrast in that same season we were a below average team.500 team that could have done what the Spurs did and tanked but we decided to try to win only to be eliminated from the play-in it what has to been the most embarrassing fashion in NBA history.

Clutch is right in this case.

Clutch is also ignoring how SA go to where they are. They picked 18th/19th/11th/12th/9th before they finally blew it up. It wasn't like they traded away Kawhi and immediately tanked. They had 5 very similar seasons to what we had post-Kawhi (and in all honesty, 5 worse seasons as they were a worse team, with older players).

[Los_29]

I love how people bring up the Spurs. A treadmill team for 5 years with a core of Aldridge and Derozan. Derozan leaves, then a year later Murray leaves and they get lucky in the lottery. Imagine if they don’t get lucky and they draft Miller or Scoot?

They were forced to tank because their team was awful and Murray wanted to get paid. Spurs have actually been poorly managed for awhile now.

[Appostis]

In a world of the Wizards,jazz and Hornets..

The flat odds have made tanking almost useless beyond late season moves.

[MiamiSPX]

We can probably get Morant now if we want. I think we should jump at it when he's available.

Not if he doesn't want to be in Toronto. The Raptors have a tendency to favor high-character guys, something that Morant is not. He's a knucklehead even on his best day. You especially don't trade for a knucklehead if he is vocal about not wanting to play for your city/team. That's a recipe for disaster.

I do not know for sure that he would nix Toronto, but it's a safe bet, backed by 30 years of evidence.

[DreamTeam09]

we are about to win 4 straight

[canada_dry]

I love how people bring up the Spurs. A treadmill team for 5 years with a core of Aldridge and Derozan. Derozan leaves, then a year later Murray leaves and they get lucky in the lottery. Imagine if they don’t get lucky and they draft Miller or Scoot?

They were forced to tank because their team was awful and Murray wanted to get paid. Spurs have actually been poorly managed for awhile now.

Devils advocate here:

Couldn't it be easily argued the Raptors were there too? Freddy left. Could have traded BOTH Pascal and og for picks since we were getting rid of both anyways, instead of just pascal for picks and OG for quickley and rj? Not to mention trying to replace freddy with dennis that offseason as well

What you described the spurs as being "forced into" you could argue the Raptors were in that position too after freddy left. They just went another direction. That's the sticking point.

Personally i don't mind trying to build through the middle. Some really good teams do that historically like the pacers and heat. We do too. That's fine imo.

My point is what you're trying to say about the spurs pretty easily can be said about the Raptors in the 2023 offseason.

Lets just be honest about it and say the Raptors usually like to build from the middle and some of us are okay with that.

If you want to build from the middle though you BETTER hit on those picks in the mid lottery to late first round, even second round (flynn dick jakobe mogbo koloko etc etc) and you better scout out and target the right players in trades like the pacers did with haliburton and we might not have with quickley.

The execution of the plan might be deserving of some criticism here at this point. It's not the end of the world and its still early. But lets just be honest about how its looking here...

Also Murray didn't just "leave" they traded him for like 4 or 5 picks to Atlanta... Freddy "left". Theres a difference there. The spurs CHOSE to make the change. The Raptors were moreso "forced" into it after freddy left and they wanted to keep him, and they still decided to swim against the way the current was pushing them.

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[ConSarnit]

I love how people bring up the Spurs. A treadmill team for 5 years with a core of Aldridge and Derozan. Derozan leaves, then a year later Murray leaves and they get lucky in the lottery. Imagine if they don’t get lucky and they draft Miller or Scoot?

They were forced to tank because their team was awful and Murray wanted to get paid. Spurs have actually been poorly managed for awhile now.

They traded Murray for 3 1sts instead of overpaying him. Getting off a guy before he gets overpaid is actually a good thing. Maybe they should have been like us and lost FVV for nothing. As of result of the Murray deal they have swap rights with ATL this year and an unprotected ‘27 1st.

They dumped Poeltl on us and got a top 10 pick out of it.

They took on Barnes (a solid role player) and got an unprotected swap with SAC in 2031.

They drafted Castle (ROY).

Even removing Wemby, they tanked and came out of it with multiple surplus upside 1sts. They recognized they had a treadmill team got off that treadmill. They got some lotto luck but they built an asset pool that allowed them to get Fox and retain a future asset base that should allow them to chase another star. Compared to the “asset” base we compiled (while missing the playoffs 3 straight years) and we look like a joke compared to the Spurs.

[ConSarnit]

I love how people bring up the Spurs. A treadmill team for 5 years with a core of Aldridge and Derozan. Derozan leaves, then a year later Murray leaves and they get lucky in the lottery. Imagine if they don’t get lucky and they draft Miller or Scoot?

They were forced to tank because their team was awful and Murray wanted to get paid. Spurs have actually been poorly managed for awhile now.

Devils advocate here:

Couldn't it be easily argued the Raptors were there too? Freddy left. Could have traded BOTH Pascal and og for picks since we were getting rid of both anyways, instead of just pascal for picks and OG for quickley and rj? Not to mention trying to replace freddy with dennis that offseason as well

What you described the spurs as being "forced into" you could argue the Raptors were in that position too after freddy left. They just went another direction. That's the sticking point.

Personally i don't mind trying to build through the middle. Some really good teams do that historically like the pacers and heat. We do too. That's fine imo.

My point is what you're trying to say about the spurs pretty easily can be said about the Raptors in the 2023 offseason.

Lets just be honest about it and say the Raptors usually like to build from the middle and some of us are okay with that.

If you want to build from the middle though you BETTER hit on those picks in the mid lottery to late first round, even second round (flynn dick jakobe mogbo koloko etc etc) and you better scout out and target the right players in trades like the pacers did with haliburton and we might not have with quickley.

The execution of the plan might be deserving of some criticism here at this point. It's not the end of the world and its still early. But lets just be honest about how its looking here...

Also Murray didn't just "leave" they traded him for like 4 or 5 picks to Atlanta... Freddy "left". Theres a difference there. The spurs CHOSE to make the change. The Raptors were moreso "forced" into it after freddy left and they wanted to keep him, and they still decided to swim against the way the current was pushing them.

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The Spurs are basically the anti-Raptors. They saw a team that was going nowhere and sold their players off while they still had value (Poeltl, White and Murray). They purposely bottomed out while collecting a surplus of 1sts.

Compare that to the Raptors who were forced to tank through their own ineptness even though they OWED valuable draft capital. They got middling (or no, in FVV’s case) returns for their former core because they held on too long.

Tanking guarantees nothing but the Spurs put themselves in the best position to try and make it a success. Compared to them the Raptors have been managed very poorly.

It’s honestly a joke that we missed the playoffs for 3 straight years and the best we managed to do was draft 13th and 9th in those years. Anyone defending it is just a homer.

[canada_dry]

I love how people bring up the Spurs. A treadmill team for 5 years with a core of Aldridge and Derozan. Derozan leaves, then a year later Murray leaves and they get lucky in the lottery. Imagine if they don’t get lucky and they draft Miller or Scoot?

They were forced to tank because their team was awful and Murray wanted to get paid. Spurs have actually been poorly managed for awhile now.

Devils advocate here:

Couldn't it be easily argued the Raptors were there too? Freddy left. Could have traded BOTH Pascal and og for picks since we were getting rid of both anyways, instead of just pascal for picks and OG for quickley and rj? Not to mention trying to replace freddy with dennis that offseason as well

What you described the spurs as being "forced into" you could argue the Raptors were in that position too after freddy left. They just went another direction. That's the sticking point.

Personally i don't mind trying to build through the middle. Some really good teams do that historically like the pacers and heat. We do too. That's fine imo.

My point is what you're trying to say about the spurs pretty easily can be said about the Raptors in the 2023 offseason.

Lets just be honest about it and say the Raptors usually like to build from the middle and some of us are okay with that.

If you want to build from the middle though you BETTER hit on those picks in the mid lottery to late first round, even second round (flynn dick jakobe mogbo koloko etc etc) and you better scout out and target the right players in trades like the pacers did with haliburton and we might not have with quickley.

The execution of the plan might be deserving of some criticism here at this point. It's not the end of the world and its still early. But lets just be honest about how its looking here...

Also Murray didn't just "leave" they traded him for like 4 or 5 picks to Atlanta... Freddy "left". Theres a difference there. The spurs CHOSE to make the change. The Raptors were moreso "forced" into it after freddy left and they wanted to keep him, and they still decided to swim against the way the current was pushing them.

Sent from my SM-G960W using RealGM mobile app

The Spurs are basically the anti-Raptors. They saw a team that was going nowhere and sold their players off while they still had value (Poeltl, White and Murray). They purposely bottomed out while collecting a surplus of 1sts.

Compare that to the Raptors who were forced to tank through their own ineptness even though they OWED valuable draft capital. They got middling (or no, in FVV’s case) returns for their former core because they held on too long.

Tanking guarantees nothing but the Spurs put themselves in the best position to try and make it a success. Compared to them the Raptors have been managed very poorly.

It’s honestly a joke that we missed the playoffs for 3 straight years and the best we managed to do was draft 13th and 9th in those years. Anyone defending it is just a homer.

I think the return for.pascal turned out to be much better than people were whining about at the time.

Og seemed.like the better deal of the 2 at the time but now? Idk about that...

Again i want to reiterate i don't mind building from the middle and i think theres way too many cautionary tales of tanking teams ending up with the 5th and 6th picks in the draft and play in teams getting theb#1 pick with the new lottery odds to champion tanking as the solution... indiana is notorious for never tanking and were just 1 win away from the title. Thats a team we should compare ourselves with. Howd they do it? What moves on the margins did they execute well to fill the team out. I already gave the example of targeting the right player in a trade in haliburton vs our target in quickley, but the drafting and other smaller trades all added up too. We're not doing enough of that imo. Unlike you i dont mind the 13th and 9th pick..go look at history. Theres value there. But did we GET said value from those picks? Im high on cmb so im not criticizing that but im getting real worried about dick...

The execution of this plan as I've stated above might be deserving of some criticism because you cant swing and miss on some of these things... the jury is still out but im getting concerned.

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[nikster]

I love how people bring up the Spurs. A treadmill team for 5 years with a core of Aldridge and Derozan. Derozan leaves, then a year later Murray leaves and they get lucky in the lottery. Imagine if they don’t get lucky and they draft Miller or Scoot?

They were forced to tank because their team was awful and Murray wanted to get paid. Spurs have actually been poorly managed for awhile now.

Devils advocate here:

Couldn't it be easily argued the Raptors were there too? Freddy left. Could have traded BOTH Pascal and og for picks since we were getting rid of both anyways, instead of just pascal for picks and OG for quickley and rj? Not to mention trying to replace freddy with dennis that offseason as well

What you described the spurs as being "forced into" you could argue the Raptors were in that position too after freddy left. They just went another direction. That's the sticking point.

Personally i don't mind trying to build through the middle. Some really good teams do that historically like the pacers and heat. We do too. That's fine imo.

My point is what you're trying to say about the spurs pretty easily can be said about the Raptors in the 2023 offseason.

Lets just be honest about it and say the Raptors usually like to build from the middle and some of us are okay with that.

If you want to build from the middle though you BETTER hit on those picks in the mid lottery to late first round, even second round (flynn dick jakobe mogbo koloko etc etc) and you better scout out and target the right players in trades like the pacers did with haliburton and we might not have with quickley.

The execution of the plan might be deserving of some criticism here at this point. It's not the end of the world and its still early. But lets just be honest about how its looking here...

Also Murray didn't just "leave" they traded him for like 4 or 5 picks to Atlanta... Freddy "left". Theres a difference there. The spurs CHOSE to make the change. The Raptors were moreso "forced" into it after freddy left and they wanted to keep him, and they still decided to swim against the way the current was pushing them.

Sent from my SM-G960W using RealGM mobile app

The Spurs are basically the anti-Raptors. They saw a team that was going nowhere and sold their players off while they still had value (Poeltl, White and Murray). They purposely bottomed out while collecting a surplus of 1sts.

Compare that to the Raptors who were forced to tank through their own ineptness even though they OWED valuable draft capital. They got middling (or no, in FVV’s case) returns for their former core because they held on too long.

Tanking guarantees nothing but the Spurs put themselves in the best position to try and make it a success. Compared to them the Raptors have been managed very poorly.

It’s honestly a joke that we missed the playoffs for 3 straight years and the best we managed to do was draft 13th and 9th in those years. Anyone defending it is just a homer.

How can you say the Spurs got rid of their core while they had value? Look at that 48 win team Derozans first year. They lost virtually all the contributors to that team for very little.

Aldridge, Mills, Belinelli, and Gay all just walked. They traded Bertans for a few games of washed Demare Carroll. Bryn Forbes traded for nothing of value. Derozans return was a future first and Young who allowed them to move up a bit in a later draft. Derrick White is the only one they got good value for of their top 8 contributors. Not to mention they were in that position because they traded Kawhi for an extremely flawed all star rather than blow it up.

TWO would have absolutely hated their asset management right up until the Murray trade.

[Basketball_Jones]

A lot of Spurs glazing and I actually love that organization. But until they do something in the playoffs it is all premature at this point. I’m not sold on Harper and Castle yet either.

[anotherhomer]

A lot of Spurs glazing and I actually love that organization. But until they do something in the playoffs it is all premature at this point. I’m not sold on Harper and Castle yet either.

they have way too many good players, not to do bad

Castle has taken the sophomore leap, Dylan Harper is an amazing #2 pick, Wemby has taken a leap
Fox hasn't come back

That team will do really well

[DelAbbot]

A lot of Spurs glazing and I actually love that organization. But until they do something in the playoffs it is all premature at this point. I’m not sold on Harper and Castle yet either.

they have way too many good players, not to do bad

Castle has taken the sophomore leap, Dylan Harper is an amazing #2 pick, Wemby has taken a leap
Fox hasn't come back

That team will do really well

They only need an OG-type big-wing to defend and then multiple championships

[Tacoma]

Devils advocate here:

Couldn't it be easily argued the Raptors were there too? Freddy left. Could have traded BOTH Pascal and og for picks since we were getting rid of both anyways, instead of just pascal for picks and OG for quickley and rj? Not to mention trying to replace freddy with dennis that offseason as well

What you described the spurs as being "forced into" you could argue the Raptors were in that position too after freddy left. They just went another direction. That's the sticking point.

Personally i don't mind trying to build through the middle. Some really good teams do that historically like the pacers and heat. We do too. That's fine imo.

My point is what you're trying to say about the spurs pretty easily can be said about the Raptors in the 2023 offseason.

Lets just be honest about it and say the Raptors usually like to build from the middle and some of us are okay with that.

If you want to build from the middle though you BETTER hit on those picks in the mid lottery to late first round, even second round (flynn dick jakobe mogbo koloko etc etc) and you better scout out and target the right players in trades like the pacers did with haliburton and we might not have with quickley.

The execution of the plan might be deserving of some criticism here at this point. It's not the end of the world and its still early. But lets just be honest about how its looking here...

Also Murray didn't just "leave" they traded him for like 4 or 5 picks to Atlanta... Freddy "left". Theres a difference there. The spurs CHOSE to make the change. The Raptors were moreso "forced" into it after freddy left and they wanted to keep him, and they still decided to swim against the way the current was pushing them.

Sent from my SM-G960W using RealGM mobile app

The Spurs are basically the anti-Raptors. They saw a team that was going nowhere and sold their players off while they still had value (Poeltl, White and Murray). They purposely bottomed out while collecting a surplus of 1sts.

Compare that to the Raptors who were forced to tank through their own ineptness even though they OWED valuable draft capital. They got middling (or no, in FVV’s case) returns for their former core because they held on too long.

Tanking guarantees nothing but the Spurs put themselves in the best position to try and make it a success. Compared to them the Raptors have been managed very poorly.

It’s honestly a joke that we missed the playoffs for 3 straight years and the best we managed to do was draft 13th and 9th in those years. Anyone defending it is just a homer.

How can you say the Spurs got rid of their core while they had value? Look at that 48 win team Derozans first year. They lost virtually all the contributors to that team for very little.

Aldridge, Mills, Belinelli, and Gay all just walked. They traded Bertans for a few games of washed Demare Carroll. Bryn Forbes traded for nothing of value. Derozans return was a future first and Young who allowed them to move up a bit in a later draft. Derrick White is the only one they got good value for of their top 8 contributors. Not to mention they were in that position because they traded Kawhi for an extremely flawed all star rather than blow it up.

TWO would have absolutely hated their asset management right up until the Murray trade.

Why keep harping on the DeRozan years? Let's just assume SAS were wrong to have traded for him, but they nonetheless rebuilt/tanked at the right time trading away Derrick White and Dejonte Murray for a host of draft picks & swaps in 2022, and Poeltl in 2023 for more picks that also quicken the tank. All the alleged wrongs they did prior & during DeRozan years became moot because they rebuilt/tanked at the right time and got Wemby.

In the meantime, we did the opposite in 2023 and expended draft capital at the trade deadline to get Poeltl to try to make the playoffs and failed and haven't made the playoffs any year since the trade. Inexcusable.

The issue I had with Masai post 2019 was he'd try to win at beginning of every year and only decide to tank midway when it became clear we were too far out to make the playoffs. These halfhearted tanks cost us draft position. Spurs did it the right way at the right time and got Wemby. They were lucky of course, but as Benjamin Franklin once noted: "Diligence is the mother of good luck." SAS did their diligence & timed it perfectly.

[Pointgod]

A lot of Spurs glazing and I actually love that organization. But until they do something in the playoffs it is all premature at this point. I’m not sold on Harper and Castle yet either.

they have way too many good players, not to do bad

Castle has taken the sophomore leap, Dylan Harper is an amazing #2 pick, Wemby has taken a leap
Fox hasn't come back

That team will do really well

They only need an OG-type big-wing to defend and then multiple championships

They might have one in Carter Bryant. Hell they might be good enough to make a deep playoff run now.

[Clutch0z24]

When they had a real choice between competing and tanking they choose competing. Hence trading for derozan and holding onto him for 3 years until he was 32 while Gay and Aldridge aged out.

The year before the tank Spurs were a 34 win team and only had to get rid of Murray to bottom out. Raptors were coming off a 48 win season and would have had to get rid of multiple contributors to bottom out. Those situations were not remotely similar.

We are not remotely like those derozan/Aldridge spurs because of age, prospects and assets. It's a terrible strawman, are you advocating us becoming the Charlotte Hornets with multiple 20 win season in the least few years with nothing to show for it?

The Spurs were a play-in team the previous two seasons before 2022/2023. They let go of Derozan, Aldridge, Rudy Gay, and some vets and won 1 more game the following season even after they traded Derrick that same season. Dejounte Murray was coming off an allstar season when they traded him for peanuts. To say they weren’t purposely tanking is inaccurate because they did everything they could to be bad including trading Poeltl to us for a steal in the 2023 season.

By contrast in that same season we were a below average team.500 team that could have done what the Spurs did and tanked but we decided to try to win only to be eliminated from the play-in it what has to been the most embarrassing fashion in NBA history.

Clutch is right in this case.

Clutch is also ignoring how SA go to where they are. They picked 18th/19th/11th/12th/9th before they finally blew it up. It wasn't like they traded away Kawhi and immediately tanked. They had 5 very similar seasons to what we had post-Kawhi (and in all honesty, 5 worse seasons as they were a worse team, with older players).

You just in that paragraph made my point lmao....Where were the Spurs when they were winning 30-35 wins and picking 18th/19th/11th/12th/9th? Were they a good team at all in them years? Did they have a bright future everyone was excited about? or were they just a team going no where?

You tell me lol....What exactly changed for the Spurs since them mid and bad seasons with bad draft picks? They started to tank and tried to go for high end draft picks....Thats what changed and helped them succeed....Yes luck is involved but they gave themselves the best chances at the luck to swing in their favor and it did and now they are one of the best young teams in the NBA that everyone is excited about.

Now do you want the Raptors to continue for the next 5 years here to keep going down that path and picking in the late teens to early teens and more than likely drafting role players/fringe starters or would you want them to switch it up and try and actually get a true real franchise player we can all be excited about? Because Barnes aint that guy and we are not trading for one either.

[Clutch0z24]

Im not clowning them, but I dont see how you can hold them up as some sort of ideal of tanking when by your own standard they should have been tanking ever since Kawhi demanded out.

All they did was trade Dejounte Murray, its not like they completely tore down a team.

Idk if you are trolling or just that dense....You do realize Spurs did infact TANK and won by drafting a future dynasty....That is success and ideal for any franchise....Do you advocate for us to continue to try and be a play in team with a DeRozan/Aldridge style of team for 5 more years till 2030 and hope for different results than what we have been getting for 5 years now already?....If so than idk what to tell you but you should just become a fan of a different sport because Raptors will do absolutly nothing in the near future with the mindset you have. Spurs were doing it and pivoted like any smart franchise would do because they knew they were headed no where....The problem is people like you and people who think like you and franchises that think like you end up having years and years of a bad basketball product....Spurs switched it up and now are looking great...

I think its pretty obvious to majority of Raptor fans that this team needs new talent brand new top end talent and where do you find that? We are not making a magic trade for Giannis to save us this time lol....

When they had a real choice between competing and tanking they choose competing. Hence trading for derozan and holding onto him for 3 years until he was 32 while Gay and Aldridge aged out.

The year before the tank Spurs were a 34 win team and only had to get rid of Murray to bottom out. Raptors were coming off a 48 win season and would have had to get rid of multiple contributors to bottom out. Those situations were not remotely similar.

We are not remotely like those derozan/Aldridge spurs because of age, prospects and assets. It's a terrible strawman, are you advocating us becoming the Charlotte Hornets with multiple 20 win season in the least few years with nothing to show for it?

No i am advocating for a totally new roster with totally different players at the top of the franchise. Barnes is not it, Ingram is good but hes not a franchise guy, No one on this roster has that kind of upside...

We are a team with talent that doesn't mesh together well and no player at the top that is going to lead us anywhere even with growth or adding more roleplayer/good starters....We need a new go to player and a guy that can lead the franchise...

We are not trading for one, We are not getting one in free agency....We need to draft one that is how you go from nothing to something in the NBA....It is much harder said than done yes....But you have to at least try at this point because what we are doing atm has not worked and won't work no matter how much you say it will....

There are 3 players in the 2026 draft and more will come in the upcoming drafts there could be a player that could turn this franchise around if we actually tried to go for it which is what we badly need.

[YogurtProducer]

The Spurs were a play-in team the previous two seasons before 2022/2023. They let go of Derozan, Aldridge, Rudy Gay, and some vets and won 1 more game the following season even after they traded Derrick that same season. Dejounte Murray was coming off an allstar season when they traded him for peanuts. To say they weren’t purposely tanking is inaccurate because they did everything they could to be bad including trading Poeltl to us for a steal in the 2023 season.

By contrast in that same season we were a below average team.500 team that could have done what the Spurs did and tanked but we decided to try to win only to be eliminated from the play-in it what has to been the most embarrassing fashion in NBA history.

Clutch is right in this case.

Clutch is also ignoring how SA go to where they are. They picked 18th/19th/11th/12th/9th before they finally blew it up. It wasn't like they traded away Kawhi and immediately tanked. They had 5 very similar seasons to what we had post-Kawhi (and in all honesty, 5 worse seasons as they were a worse team, with older players).

You just in that paragraph made my point lmao....Where were the Spurs when they were winning 30-35 wins and picking 18th/19th/11th/12th/9th? Were they a good team at all in them years? Did they have a bright future everyone was excited about? or were they just a team going no where?

You tell me lol....What exactly changed for the Spurs since them mid and bad seasons with bad draft picks? They started to tank and tried to go for high end draft picks....Thats what changed and helped them succeed.

They moved up in the lottery 3 straight years. That is what changed. Like are you freakin' kidding me man?

2025 - 8th best odds - 26% chance to move up to the top 4
2024 - 5th best odds - 42% chance to move up to the top 4
2023 - 3rd best odds - 52% chacne to move up (or stay top 4, rather)

2022 - 9th best odds - 20% chance to move up
2021 - 12th best odds - 8% chance to move up
2020 - 11th best odds - 10% chacne to move up

So yes, you are right they "had better odds" but they still moved up in a draft 3 times in 3 years when statistically they had a 5% chance of that happening. Thats right, they had a lower % chance of moving up in 2023 thru 2025 3 times than they did moving up ONCE between 2020 and 2022.

What changed for the Spurs? LUCK.

Imagine if 2023 thru 2025 they didn't move up once (which was more likely to happen than 3 times), and they got Egor Demin, Ron Holland, and Scoot Henderson instead of Wemby/Castle/Harper.

[Clutch0z24]

Clutch is also ignoring how SA go to where they are. They picked 18th/19th/11th/12th/9th before they finally blew it up. It wasn't like they traded away Kawhi and immediately tanked. They had 5 very similar seasons to what we had post-Kawhi (and in all honesty, 5 worse seasons as they were a worse team, with older players).

You just in that paragraph made my point lmao....Where were the Spurs when they were winning 30-35 wins and picking 18th/19th/11th/12th/9th? Were they a good team at all in them years? Did they have a bright future everyone was excited about? or were they just a team going no where?

You tell me lol....What exactly changed for the Spurs since them mid and bad seasons with bad draft picks? They started to tank and tried to go for high end draft picks....Thats what changed and helped them succeed.

They moved up in the lottery 3 straight years. That is what changed. Like are you freakin' kidding me man?

2025 - 8th best odds - 26% chance to move up to the top 4
2024 - 5th best odds - 42% chance to move up to the top 4
2023 - 3rd best odds - 52% chacne to move up (or stay top 4, rather)

2022 - 9th best odds - 20% chance to move up
2021 - 12th best odds - 8% chance to move up
2020 - 11th best odds - 10% chacne to move up

So yes, you are right they "had better odds" but they still moved up in a draft 3 times in 3 years when statistically they had a 5% chance of that happening. Thats right, they had a lower % chance of moving up in 2023 thru 2025 3 times than they did moving up ONCE between 2020 and 2022.

What changed for the Spurs? LUCK.

Imagine if 2023 thru 2025 they didn't move up once (which was more likely to happen than 3 times), and they got Egor Demin, Ron Holland, and Scoot Henderson instead of Wemby/Castle/Harper.

Lol you also just proved my point in that the higher you pick the better the outcome....Spurs when they got the 3 best players they have now in Wemby/Harper/Castle they actually tried to get really good odds, 3rd,5th odds you have to tank the right way to get them odds which helped them move up, 2025 Was the one you can look at and say they got really Lucky to move from 8-2...

Thing is Raptors are in the exact same situation the Spurs were in when they were trying to win with DeRozan/Aldridge but were not good enough and they kept having horrible odds at getting a top pick to get any exciting player to change the outcome of their team...We have no players on our current team that will change the direction of the team...We need to find a player that can until then we will be a sorry franchise that will keep drafting the Dicks/Jakobes of the world and will be stuck in the play in cycle.

[RealFaction]

The team has been missing an actual C prospect for years. The last one they drafted that wasn't bloody raw was Poeltl, and now he's going into his 30s with a bad back.