Our fanbase is fickle and treacherous and it makes me sick.

[LascelleL]

Our fanbase has become a miserable one, embodying the worst aspects of a 'Championship or Bust' mentality, exuding a sense of entitlement I previously thought was reserved for Lakers/Celtics fans. I'm puzzled about its origins, but it's been irksome, especially the recent discourse around Scottie.

I've been a Raptors fan my entire life. My dad took me to my first game in '96, where we watched our scrappy Raptors pull off the impossible and hand the 72-10 Bulls a loss. I've seen and understood our animosity towards various players in the organization - Stoudamire, Camby, McGrady, and Carter, to name a few.

Even during the Bosh era, I noticed a tendency among our fanbase to turn on our stars, offering them scant support and seemingly doing everything possible to drive them away. This was highlighted for me on RealGM. I recall how people roasted Bosh when he was campaigning for the All-Star game, calling him pathetic and a fake star. It reached a point where Bosh even made a video joking about RealGM, acknowledging our harsh words about him.

When Bosh left, we were understandably upset, but then DeMar tweeted "I got us," and indeed, he did. Despite his year-over-year improvements, some in our fanbase belittled him, criticized his abilities, and, at one insane point, even pushed for the Raptors to trade him in favor of building around Sonny Weems.

We've had our rocky times, but then came the DeMar and Kyle era, the best stretch of basketball in our team's history, yet the misery persisted. The criticism shifted from DeMar to Kyle, especially when Kyle missed that shot in the playoffs against the Nets. You know the one, where Pierce blocked him from behind in OT, the Kyle hate reached an all time high despite Kyle's buzzer-beater that took the game to OT initially. The debate oscillated between trading DeMar or Kyle and opting for a rebuild.

Now, in this era, with Kyle gone, the fanbase has turned on our players one by one - first FVV, then OG, then Pascal, and now Masai, Bobby, and Scottie are facing the brunt of the criticism. Some are even calling for Masai's firing, regretting not trading Scottie for Dame or KD.

It's bewildering, especially considering a significant portion of our fanbase was clamoring for a rebuild. Now that it's underway, they've turned on Scottie, despite his All-Star selection in his third year. He's had a few off games, but these are the moments when our support should be unwavering, particularly given his significant improvement and adjustment to a major mid-season roster change. This change has placed him at the forefront of defense and as the primary focus of every scouting report. It's a tall order, and the fanbase's scrutiny is incredibly shortsighted, reeking of a 'Championship or Bust' mentality without any patience for growing pains.

I'm tired of witnessing this, and I'm fed up with those who begged for a rebuild now bemoaning the nature of rebuilding basketball. Newsflash: this is what it looks like. It involves growing pains. Either enjoy the journey you pleaded for or, at the very least, offer some genuine support for a player and a front office that has, by all accounts, exceeded expectations.

TLDR: Raptors fans. Stop the bitching. Enjoy the rebuild. This is the bottom of the mountain and the peak will be even sweeter but it won't happen if we drive away our future Star and competent FO.

[NotMyKawhi]

Masai and bobby deserve it.

Scottie young. His bad games he's gets triple doubles. Not worried abt him. Im worried masai and Bobby trading more 1sts for Kelly, Poeltl or Thad

[dTox]

I don't think this is unique to Raptors fanbase, if you follow other teams or sports, you'll see the same pattern in almost every fanbase. Ask former Lakers/Celtics players how much pressure and negativity their fans put on their players, it is significantly worse than ours. Ask certain black soccer players how they feel about having banana peels thrown at them in European leagues , or even English players after they lost to Italy in Eurocup, ours is miniscule in comparison to other fanbases.

[Steelo Green]

So your point to stop bitching is by bitching?

[DelAbbot]

I was told to enjoy the ride at the beginning of Tampa season (when we should have started this rebuild but didn't)

I am being told to enjoy the ride now after all that has happened.

[Badonkadonk]

TLDR: Raptors fans. Stop the bitching. Enjoy the rebuild. This is the bottom of the mountain and the peak will be even sweeter but it won't happen if we drive away our future Star and competent FO.

RGM is also a meme in social media because the misery is concentrated, and there's an echo chamber of people who are deep down the Dunning Kruger hole.

I wouldn't take this place or many of the twitter accounts seriously, especially the latter since they're mostly engagement rage-farming.

[Potential]

Lost by 40 at home to the worst team in the west that lost 22 of 27 this season on the road and on a 7 game losing streak and will have our draft pick

[xAIRNESSx]

For some reason a lot of people think winning the championship is an easy thing. Tank for a few years, draft some future stars and boom.

[refshateRaps]

Those that are critical don't feel entitled to tell others how for to be a 'fan'.

Sincerely, do you bud as no one is stopping you from cheering the loses.

[Duffman100]

Those that are critical don't feel entitled to tell others how for to be a 'fan'.

You can't be serious.

[refshateRaps]

Those that are critical don't feel entitled to tell others how for to be a 'fan'.

You can't be serious.

Bro this forums has rules to police negative opinions and tried to use it during the most hap-hazard rebuild ever.



While I debate the rose couloured glasses fans, and the fake azz pumpers... I haven't seen threads telling them how they are suppose to cheer to be a fan

[Raptorland23]

Stop publicly anointing players franchise players that aren't franchise players, spending several years trying to build around them and you would see less complaining. The same thing is happening again with Scottie Barnes, the FO, media and some fans claiming he is a generational talent, a franchise player that we MUST build around.

I mean we just heard it a while ago on a national stage, Darko - "Scottie Barnes is going to be the face of the league". What a delusional poor statement to make, it's sad if they believe that, the pressure put on the kid and years of failure trying to build around a player that is not a true generational talent is not healthy or successful and is the root cause of all the years of crap you are talking about.

If the franchise were honest and weren't all about selling tickets and making money they wouldn't have spent all those years claiming guys like Bosh, Demar, Camby, Pascal Siakam, Stoudimire were generational talents. No, they were mostly all very good players that were or could have been great PIECES to team with a REAL generational talent to win a title.

We are doing the same damn thing again with Scottie Barnes, I am not here to make money and sell you anything, so I can honestly tell you that Scottie Barnes is a good player that may be a good piece to have with a REAL generational talent, which if that were to happen we may have a shot at contending one day. What will never happen and I can say this with 100% certainty after three years of watching the kid, we will never contend if the goal is to put a bunch of B and C level players around Barnes.

The FO, media, select fans do it to themselves.

[artsncrafts]

Again, you fail to realize this is a half baked rebuild right now. Its more of a retool actually, and the team is awful. They arent tanking, they are trying to win, Masai wants to convey this year so we likely wont have our pick. The "core" is set, yet they are bad.

IQ, RJ, Scottie, Purtle, that is the next 3 years. Next year it will be the exact same team + mid draft pick if they dont trade it and they likely pick up option on BB to trade and re-sign GTJ/IQ. There will not be enough internal growth to even get to the play in with this core. So then you are hoping with this core they get a top 5 pick in 2025 and draft a superstar? You cant do half ass rebuilds. You need to tank and draft stars. In the history of the Raptors franchise they have not signed a single good FA.

This is why I am bitching anyways, they are in no-mans land right now and they dont have their pick this year so its more no-mans land next year.

For some reason a lot of people think winning the championship is an easy thing. Tank for a few years, draft some future stars and boom.

This is the issue! The team is not tanking, they dont have their pick and next year they will likely be in the 8-11 range with this core

[Duffman100]

Those that are critical don't feel entitled to tell others how for to be a 'fan'.

You can't be serious.

Bro this forums has rules to police negative opinions and tried to use it during the most hap-hazard rebuild ever

That isn't really relevant at all to what you said.

[Duffman100]

As per the initial post,

I think there are legitimate complaints - and this is coming from a pro-Masai guy. There have been critical mistakes made and I can understand people's frustrations. The Poeltl trade was ill-timed and the pick was poorly protected, we waited a bit too long to sell off our core, etc etc.

BUT.

Gradey Dick is a prime example of what you're referring to. A 19 year was declared a bust by a large portion of posters just 10-15 games into his career. Not criticized for struggling, he was declared a BUST - never going to be good, etc.

It's these massive swings in opinion that really people should attempt to moderate.

[Raptors Realtor]

Masai and bobby deserve it.

Scottie young. His bad games he's gets triple doubles. Not worried abt him. Im worried masai and Bobby trading more 1sts for Kelly, Poeltl or Thad

Uh that 1st wasn't for Olynyk, it was for Agbaji.

[Mack11]

I like how some people log in to a message board and expect everybody to have the same opinion as them

[refshateRaps]

You can't be serious.

Bro this forums has rules to police negative opinions and tried to use it during the most hap-hazard rebuild ever

That isn't really relevant at all to what you said.

Exact same entitlement and desire to control thought.

[goinrogue]

When you look at this draft class, Scottie is easily one of the best. Sengun is up there too. Otherwise they’re kind of struggling. I can only imagine this board had we drafted cade. The Pistons are better when he doesn’t play. Evan Mobley is on a good team, but his nut huggers in his rookie season have gotten awfully quiet. Scottie haters have resorted to pointing to players in different drafts to comment that player X is better. I’m not saying Scottie doesn’t deserve criticism, but we have to be realistic.

We’re not even at the end of the season, and Grady has gone from a scrub to our only hope.

[Duffman100]

Bro this forums has rules to police negative opinions and tried to use it during the most hap-hazard rebuild ever

That isn't really relevant at all to what you said.

Exact same entitlement and desire to control thought.

Again, that's not the rule nor is it relevant to what you said. But, go on...