Linkage - Jan 31
On Tuesday night, the reason the Raptors lost in Washington was that they allowed four offensive rebounds in the five-minute overtime, and got murdered on the boards all night. It’s not that Toronto is the worst rebounding team in the league — that would be Phoenix, actually. In fact, by percentage of available rebounds grabbed, the Raptors entered last night ranked 10th in the 30-team NBA in defensive rebounding, and 22nd once you factor in the offensive end.
But it’s the defensive boards, paradoxically, which is the greater structural weakness. This team was built to shoot and score, and Mitchell has had to work on shoring up the twin pillars of championship teams: Defence and rebounding. The defence has been OK, because defence is easier to manufacture. The rebounding, as Chris Bosh puts it, "is just doin’ it."
The 39-point margin of victory matched the biggest in team history, a 112-73 win over Atlanta on April 12, 2002.
NBA sources indicated last night that Stoudamire, 34, is expected to sign with the San Antonio Spurs for the remainder of the season. The Memphis Grizzlies bought out the guard’s contract and waived him this week.
Stats types will tell you that winning margin is a better indicator of the quality of a team than just their won-loss record. Again, this is grain of salt territory, as the point is to win, whether it’s by one or by 101. But I think the suggestion is that if you are team that is capable of winning fairly big, fairly regularly, you have to talent to win a lot. Anyway, according to John Hollinger, winning margin is a better predictor of team quality than winning percentage. The Raptors winning margin is now 3.42. Recent performance is important too, and the Raptors margin in the last quarter of their schedule is now a hefty 9.33. The result is that the Raptors are ranked No.4 in the most current edition of his power rankings
At the offensive end, the starters were certainly solid, but the reserve unit stepped up to contribute 53 points.
Rasho Nesterovic, who played 14 minutes in the first half because of Bosh’s situation, was especially effective. He scored nine points, including an emphatic put-back dunk off a missed rebound.
Juan Dixon, spelling Jose Calderon at the point, scored 12 points and dished out four assists, running a second unit that looked as good as it has in weeks.
"We’re going to need him," Mitchell said. "He’s been playing well the last week or so. I think I’m gaining more confidence in him out there at the point guard."
"It was very important we bounced back,” Jamario Moon said in the aftermath of the dismantling of the Wizards. "We didn’t rebound, we didn’t protect the ball, we didn’t play with any energy in Washington.
"We had to come out (in last night’s return game) with a different mind-set and it was a game we had to have."
The Raptors, who yielded 19 offensive rebounds in their 108-104 loss in overtime on Tuesday, controlled the paint last night and just about every spot on the floor.
Instead of turning the ball over, the Raptors were forcing turnovers, knocking down shots and basically were able to do anything they wanted on a night the home side never trailed.
"We might be seeing this team again down the road,” Maceo Baston said. "It was important we send a message. Everyone knew we didn’t play our best in Washington."
Jamario Moon’s all-star weekend just got busier.
One of the NBA’s feel-good stories, the self-made player has been selected to play in the league’s annual rookie challenge as part of the schmooz-fest known as all-star weekend.
Joining Moon will be Raptors teammate Andrea Bargnani, who will line up against the athletic Moon on the sophomore side when the game tips off Feb. 15 in New Orleans.
But with Jose Calderon playing the point like an all-star and Ford’s return now a matter of when, and not if, (GM Bryan Colangelo said last night that it’s "just a matter of time") the point guard situation is no longer something that is causing coach Sam Mitchell’s stomach to churn. He always will have the media for that.
Which is good, because the Raptors have lost the Damon Stoudamire sweepstakes, though not through any fault of their own.
"It’s okay that we win by 30-something but we are upset about (Tuesday) night," said Jose Calderon. "We were mad because of (Tuesday’s) game, so we just came out and just tried to play our basketball game, to be more aggressive and we did that from the beginning. We did not let them come back, that’s what we need to do."
Andrea Bargnani, maligned for his poor shooting in so many recent games, exploded for 19 points and Anthony Parker had 16 as the Raptors won easily despite a less-than-dominating performance by Chris Bosh, who had 16.
a representative of the NBA Players’ Association addressed the Raptors recently on matters of financial prudence. A statistic was cited during the meeting that startled some of the hoopsters. It was said that 60 per cent of retired NBA players go broke five years after their NBA paycheques stop arriving.
"How could that be?" said Jamario Moon, the Raptors rookie. "I don’t want to believe that stat."
But that stat, used by the players’ association to get the attention of young millionaires, is thought to be an educated estimate.
"Sixty per cent is a ballpark. But we’ve seen a lot of guys who’ve really come into hard times five years after they leave the league," said Roy Hinson, the former NBA forward who’s a representative for the players’ association. "The problems are, for a lot of guys, they have a lot of cars, they have multiple houses, they’re taking care of their parents. They’re taking care of a whole host of issues. And the cheques aren’t coming in anymore."
Ford, who hasn’t played since suffering a neck and back injury in a fall during a Dec.11 game, is ready to return to the team after spending a couple of weeks in his hometown of Houston working out with former NBA star John Lucas.
It’s unclear when Ford may play again – it’s going to take some time for him to get used to the speed of an NBA game again – but it’s not out of the realm of possibility he could be back in uniform right around the Feb.15-17 all-star break.
Did you notice that the two best three-point shooting games, and the two best scoring nights in a month (at Boston, vs. Washington) came when Bargnani got it going? No matter his shortcomings, he’s got to play because on nights he’s even okay from the field it just opens up so many more shots for everyone. Teams have to guard him when he’s on the floor and that creates space.
Add Toronto to the list of cities you won’t want to play in come playoff time. While the Raptors have a losing record on the road, they are certainly making it dangerous for foes that decide to travel across the border. On Wednesday, they made the Wizards their latest victim. Andrea Bargnani scored a game-high 19 points and Chris Bosh added 16 as Toronto never trailed and won by 39 in its home rout of Washington. It was the Raptors’ sixth straight win in their northern kingdom. During that stretch, Toronto has dismantled its opponents by an average of 21 points.
"If this had been a game of H-O-R-S-E, it would have been over in the first quarter," Wizards guard DeShawn Stevenson said. "They came out like they are supposed to at home after a loss. We said before the game that they play at a faster tempo at home and we just didn’t match it and then once they started making shots, they got rolling. They were on fire."
Were they ever.
After shooting 42.5 percent in Tuesday’s 108-104 overtime loss at Verizon Center, the Raptors made six of their first eight shots in the game then blew the game open in the second quarter and easily countered anything resembling a Wizards run with a barrage of shots from all angles.
No single Raptor had a huge night but 12 players scored, led by center Andrea Bargnani (19 points). Point guard Jose Calderon played a beautiful floor game (11 points, 11 assists, 1 turnovers). The Raptors had 30 assists to Washington’s 13 and the blowout allowed Chris Bosh, who scored 37 points in 50 minutes on Tuesday, to spend the fourth quarter on the bench resting.
A dream acquisition for the Nuggets: Toronto’s Jose Calderon, a 26-year-old point guard who not only is worth every cent of his $2.5 million salary, he’s a better player than ballyhooed teammate T.J. Ford.
The problem? Denver can offer the Raptors no reasonable salary-cap match in trade, unless Toronto general manager Bryan Colangelo suddenly feels an inexplicable need for the chronic migraines that could be supplied by the enfant terrible act of petulant Nuggets guard J.R. Smith.
I believe that Bosh is arguably one of the ten best players in the NBA. He reminds me of a young Tim Duncan, who every night put up solid numbers but because he wasn’t flashy he didn’t get the attention he deserved from the fans and basketball pundits. It wasn’t until Duncan led his team to a championship that he was considered a superstar. Bosh will hopefully get accorded that status before the Raptors win a championship.
With a record of 25-20 the Raptors find themselves as the fifth seed in the Eastern Conference and in a prime position to control their own destiny. Ford has talked about returning to the team shortly and their schedule in February is highly favourable as only 3 of their 12 games are against teams with winning records. Throw into the mix that 8 of those 12 games are at home and it’s clear that this part of their schedule is an ideal team to move up in the standings.
Hopefully the return of Ford combined with an easier schedule in the second half is just what the Raptors need to make a late season push.
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