The Ringer: Raptors should consider blowing it up

[Vlade Divac]

I have no problem with the article at all. I would do the same thing. Depends how honest we want to be to ourselves these are all hard cold facts and no amount of homer-ism can negate it. If you asked me 2 weeks ago about this article I would supported it 100%, but since we did make significant strides for better I am willing to wait and see what Playoffs brings in. It is hard to place expected result in Playoff, but I would say anything less than competitive loss in ECF would be trigger for me to do suggested way out.

This chart is telling and it just prove that eye test does not lie:

[ruckus]

The Ringer has a point. I'm completely against blowing it up but, I also don't want this team to turn into the teams that Atlanta and Indiana turned into. Reasonably, there's more at play here than just running up against the Lebron wall. So the key here is how much we trust Masai/Weltman to maintain this level of success while not completely shortchanging the future.

[theonlyeastcoastrapsfan]

Lets not blow this idea out of water because so much of what we do depends on what Kyle wants to do. We may be left trying to make lemonade out of it all by early july.

[OakleyDokely]

You run this team out there as long as they're winning close to 50 games. Once they start to fall into .500 territory, then it's time to blow it up. You don't want to get into the position where you're losing in the 1st round (or just missing the playoffs) and picking 15th.

[NiL8r87]

Blowing it up now would be silly.

1. We'd at least be able to enjoy a few more years of competitive playoff basketball
2. We wouldn't be able to get anything for 4 of our major pieces (Lowry, Ibaka, Tucker, Patterson)
3. We still have a couple more years to trade DeMar whenever and get a good return, I can't see him declining any time soon.

[5playersnot1]

Has any team coming off 2 wins in the ECF against the eventual champs chose to blow it up the following year, where they arguably had an improved, more balance team?

I understand Boston and Washington are also better, but that's why you play the games. If every great but not elite team chose to rebuild there would be no league. The NBA has era's of dominant generational players. Should the Jazz have blown up Stockton/Malone in the Jordan era? Should every team team in the East quit until Lebron retires? Eventually he will lose. When? Who knows, but we won't have a chance to be that team if we're not in the fight. Punchers chance is what took down the Shaq, Kobe, Payton, Malone past prime superteam. I'd much rather be in the mix than waiting for Lebron, and then eventually Lebron James Jr to retire.

[nabbs]

Whether you agree with him or not, O'Conner is a good writer. The article is well-written and well-supported. Many on hear have considered the notion of blowing it up if Kyle walks because this team is an elite treadmill team with an ageing Ibaka, Plateauing Demar and no real PG (assuming Kyle walks)

[gerrit4]

Maybe the Ringer should blow it up. They are really missing that superstar writer like Lowe or high character guys like Jalen and Jacoby to have a strong brand.

They blow it up, start over and negotiate for some solid talent.

Bill and either Grantland and the Ringer has been begging the Raps to blow it up for years! Talk about narrow focus, narrative hustlers.

Edit: valid point on Click Bait. Honest point I didn't hit the link. Which I guess makes me somewhat narrow headed myself.

I know this is somewhat tongue-in-cheek, but after a year the Ringer has actually started getting much better. I think Simmons show getting cancelled has helped the site get stronger.

That being said, this article is trash, and yes, they are still in need of a great NBA writer (and podcaster) like Lowe, or (in my opinion), genuinely funny guys like Jalen & Jacoby. Ha, in a way maybe they are on the treadmill of being good but not great.

The main problem with the article (and why it reads like clickbait) is that the "solutions" are pretty vague and meaningless. It's basically just an "I told you so" in case he's right type of article. There's no interesting insight on what the Raptors could do. Just things like "they could sign Lowry and trade him next summer" or "maybe they're better off blowing it up?" Basically, there's nothing written here that could come back to haunt him - we could win 3 championships in a row (or get swept in the playoffs three years in a row) and there's no real point he made here that could come back an haunt him. It's just noncommittal hot take garbage.

That's been Bill's real downfall for me. I love his hot takes and some of his questions. But there are a lot of other basketball head options out there that actually get into the gritty "what can they do questions" rather than throw away commentary. I'm thinking Dunc'd On Podcast here more than any.

Maybe even RealGM has taken a lot of that interest away from me. Reading some of the hot takes in here by random "nobodies" of often more entertaining than Bill's (I know he didn't write this article, just a well known fill in for bland ball journo) insight.

Give me depth (Lowe), something to chew on (Ziller), or something funny (Fast Break Breakfast) and I'll buy it.

Well, I think Simmons is really good when he's with a guy like that - his podcasts with Lowe were always really good because you'd have someone who could argue the hot takes. Part of the problem now is that Simmons is their boss, so when he's wrong, he doesn't really get called out by someone on his staff...

But again, the site is way better now than it was 6 months ago.

[slothrop8]

It's a solid article and does a pretty good job of evaluating our situation. No final decisions should be made until we see this group with Kyle of course. If the defensive gains are real and sustained with Kyle in the lineup - then maybe we have a bit of puncher's chance to win the East and you try to run this back again next year. However, if Kyle gets back and is healthy and playing well and we still get vaporized by Cleveland in the playoffs - or worse still bounced by someone else - then getting as many guys signed with the purpose of flipping them for youth and picks probably should be the path forward.

[Lockdown]

I have so many thoughts about this article, because it touches on so many fan theories about franchise building that bug me.

On the surface, the Raptors are a feel-good story. But the past three years have ended in playoff disappointment.

Unless you have sky-high Warriors-like ambitions, if your team makes it to game 6 of the Conference Finals against the eventual champs and you call it a disappointment, you might as well just stop watching sports now. They're only going to make you miserable. I can never agree with this "there's only one winner and 29 losers" mentality, it's dumb.

If you believe that the Raptors’ current core, along with younger players including Norman Powell, Jakob Poeltl, and Bruno Caboclo, gives them a shot at the Larry O’Brien Trophy, then you should be cool with re-signing Lowry, Ibaka, and the others. But if you believe this team is below the top tier — the Clevelands, Golden States, and San Antonios — and can’t afford to stand pat as its best players naturally decline, then you might have some reservations with that approach.

Let's not talk about D-leaguer Caboclo like he figures into any kind of core, Delon Wright is already way ahead of him if you want a third name. But either way, this makes no sense. Yes, they're definitely a rung below those three teams. But how does letting the team's best players go fix that? So they can clear cap space to sign Steph Curry? Not happening. Where they are now, they're realistically 1 great player away. If they let the stars walk, suddenly they're 2-3 guys away. In other words, they're nowhere. Houston's not in that triumverate either. Should they be blowing it up too?

The Raptors could become a treadmill playoff team like the Hawks or Clippers.

This isn't Atlanta where nobody cares about pro sports, that would be a wildly successful business that would always be in the conversation. As a fan who watched them be a basketball wasteland for years, this would be a great scenario. Would I prefer a championship team? Who wouldn't? But winning playoff rounds every year isn't failure, it means you're **** good, a top 8 team, and always a couple of moves away from greatness. This is far preferable to the empty lies most fanbases have to accept from their management about how amazing they're going to be one day.

I disagree with the idea of punting a season purely because an opponent seems invincible. We’ve already seen that the Warriors and Cavaliers are vulnerable. But team-building must be done with an eye toward sustainability, not hope. If Toronto’s 2017–18 season will be more of the same, with even less financial and asset flexibility to make impact additions, then the best future for the Raptors will come in the form of a teardown.

So this is the crux of the article. But I think there are any number of counter-examples showing that being capped out doesn't mean you can't improve, we've already seen this GM do it this very season. The good franchises are the ones that manage to scout diamonds in the rough drafting late, develop players well, and are able to spot undervalued players on other rosters. That is the only way to have long term success. Drafting blue chippers is way less important than that, there are tons of terrible franchises who draft great players and never do anything.

Houston's model of staying good, raising the value of peripheral players and not signing bad long term deals so you're ready when a great player becomes available is way better than just throwing games for 5 years and hoping you draft Kobe & Shaq.

[mtcan]

I have no problem with the article at all. I would do the same thing. Depends how honest we want to be to ourselves these are all hard cold facts and no amount of homer-ism can negate it. If you asked me 2 weeks ago about this article I would supported it 100%, but since we did make significant strides for better I am willing to wait and see what Playoffs brings in. It is hard to place expected result in Playoff, but I would say anything less than competitive loss in ECF would be trigger for me to do suggested way out.

This chart is telling and it just prove that eye test does not lie:

Are they using data compiled throughout the years? You can't use that same data this season because the Demar we have this season is not the same Demar as in previous seasons.

Super Saiyan Demar is having multiple 40+ point performances and is also racking up 3s, assists and rebounds throughout this stretch in which the team is on a 5 game winning streak and is 7-3 in the last 10 games.

So they basically decides to use pure numbers to build a negative case against Demar, completely ignoring the entire 2016-17 season.

Bill Simmons is basically scared of the Raptors.

[Double Helix]

You run this team out there as long as they're winning close to 50 games. Once they start to fall into .500 territory, then it's time to blow it up. You don't want to get into the position where you're losing in the 1st round (or just missing the playoffs) and picking 15th.

Agreed on this. And I think some context is required if there's a big injury like the one we just had with Lowry. I have no doubt we'd have another 50 win season this year if Kyle had been here the whole time following the Ibaka and Tucker trades.

There's always a comfort for people in hitting reset because the moment you press the reset button on the Nintendo the idea of beating the game without losing even a single life and collecting all the powerups seems possible. That will always tempt some to want to press reset at even the first sign of trouble. "Whoops, I missed that extra life. Reset. "Whoops, my energy's a little low against the boss and I'm only on level 3. Reset. We wouldn't have even had last year at all with that kind of mentality. We would have hit reset years ago. Maybe we would have been the T-Wolves. Maybe we would have had a core of Anthony Bennett, Dante Exum, Jahil Okafor and Dragan Bender. All I know for certain is that last was a ton of fun that I'm glad I was able to experience.

[dacrusha]

The Rockets have absolutely zero chance of winning the championship as they stand. The Celtics can only hope and pray that one of their top picks over the next couple of drafts turns into a generational talent, otherwise they're also destined for the 4-8 treadmill. Wizards are capped out and have faint hope that Wall/Beal can lead them to championship destiny.

Are these three blow-up candidates as well?

[ATLTimekeeper]

Whether you agree with him or not, O'Conner is a good writer. The article is well-written and well-supported. Many on hear have considered the notion of blowing it up if Kyle walks because this team is an elite treadmill team with an ageing Ibaka, Plateauing Demar and no real PG (assuming Kyle walks)

It's more the timing for me, and the fact that he's yet another Celtics' writer looking to troll our base.

[ATLTimekeeper]

You run this team out there as long as they're winning close to 50 games. Once they start to fall into .500 territory, then it's time to blow it up. You don't want to get into the position where you're losing in the 1st round (or just missing the playoffs) and picking 15th.

Finish 15th, draft next Kawhi. Blow it up when the team clearly sucks and has no chemistry or pathway to continue winning.

[nabbs]

O'Conner isn't from Boston though and if you listen to his podcasts with Simmons or Vernon, he isn't a Boston fan nor does he push some pro Boston narrative


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[ciueli]

Now is the time to go for broke because there are only three other good teams in the East. The Cavs are desperately trying to find the role players they need to stay at the top, the Celtics are too worried about hedging their bets and are unwilling to make win now moves and the Wizards aren't clearly better than the Raptors.

In a few seasons younger teams in Milwaukee and Philadelphia could be juggernauts and Boston could create a superstar core with their draft assets so it doesn't make sense to punt and build for the future where it will be even more difficult to win. Are we really building some kind of great team areound Poeltl, Wright, Powell and Siakam?

[ATLTimekeeper]

The Ringer has a point. I'm completely against blowing it up but, I also don't want this team to turn into the teams that Atlanta and Indiana turned into. Reasonably, there's more at play here than just running up against the Lebron wall. So the key here is how much we trust Masai/Weltman to maintain this level of success while not completely shortchanging the future.

Atlanta effectively "blew their team up." Let 4/5 starters go from the 60 win team go within 2 seasons. Indiana pretty much the same, and had a major injury and lost season to boot.

[ATLTimekeeper]

O'Conner isn't from Boston though and if you listen to his podcasts with Simmons or Vernon, he isn't a Boston fan nor does he push some pro Boston narrative


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A few months ago, Kevin O'Connor was hired by Bill Simmons to work on his new website The Ringer. Before that he wrote for CelticsBlog.

http://www.celticsblog.com/2017/2/13/14596436/high-five-with-kevin-oconnor-of-the-ringer-nba-draft-celtics

Just because he, like Zach Lowe, try to cover the league with a sense of balance doesn't change that they're both dyed in the wool Celtics' fans.

[Morris_Shatford]

These articles always seem to come out like within a week of clinching a playoff birth.

Let me enjoy the buzz braa.....