Linkage - March 11
Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment Ltd. wants more from the Raptor faithful, significantly more.
Season ticket renewal packages went out recently, and depending on where in the ACC you are sitting, costs are up anywhere from 10-12.5%.
Walter Dubowec has been a Raptors season ticket holder for 12 years and this latest bump is the last straw for him.
"I was shocked by my ticket renewal package (yesterday). My wife and I decided that we will not renew for next season. The cost has got to the point where it is simply way beyond reasonable for a non-corporate seat owner."
Dubowec says he has been putting up with increases just about every season with the exception of one year when Rob Babcock was GM and the prices held. The maximum increase he recalls was 5%. But in the past two seasons Dubowec’s tickets have risen almost 20%.
"My biggest fear is what will happen to the cost of my seats once the team actually becomes an elite team. My $150 ticket will soon be over $200 each. I’d rather get out now than get slammed by increases next year and the year after and so on and so on."
Sam Mitchell feigned ignorance.
"What are you talking about?" Mitchell asked. "I have no idea what you are talking about."
Chris Bosh sloughed it off as something that happened to this franchise but in a different era.
The topic was the 81 points Kobe Bryant put on the Raptors 26 months ago. It remains the second-greatest single point total in an NBA game.
Bosh is one of four players still with the team who was in uniform that night. Bosh, Joey Graham and Jose Calderon were on the court.
"It’s a different era as far as our organization is concerned," Bosh said. "At first it was like (a hangover) because people won’t let you forget about it, but I accepted it. I’m not in denial that happened. I was a spectator to it."
Bosh was questioned about his choice of the word "spectator." After all, he played a Raptor-high 43 minutes in the game.
Bosh clarified what he meant.
"I played, but everyone was a spectator on the court that night," Bosh said. "We didn’t play any defence."
So are we looking at another Kobe one-man show, the kind that had Nike busting out their Kobe 81 hoodies two seasons ago? Probably not.
The Raptors’ improved defence would not appear to be susceptible to that kind of spanking at this stage in their development, but in a season in which they can beat San Antonio and New Orleans on the road, and lose to Indiana at home and Charlotte anywhere, one has to respect the unexpected.
Or looking at it another way, maybe Kobe becomes a non-factor in a Raptors win. Just two nights ago, the Sacramento Kings proved that is possible.
A good sign of the maturation of Andrea Bargnani are his foul totals over the past four games. Bargnani, albeit playing at his more comfortable power forward spot with Chris Bosh out, has a total of four fouls in his past four games. That’s a huge improvement from the guy who had 22 fouls in the seven games prior to that stretch and managed more than 30 minutes on just two occasions.
For now, the Raptors will let the 23-year-old do as he’s done in the past, try to work through the pain and wait patiently until he’s able to get back in action.
"He’s made some progress and it’s a little slower than obviously he and everyone would like, but the reality is . . ." said Colangelo, letting the thought drift off.
"Was there concern last year when he had something similar? Yeah, there’s always concern. You want your players healthy, especially your best player."
What was originally thought to be knee pain that would keep him out of a three-game trip to Charlotte, Orlando and Miami last week now includes two games at home and at least the first two of this trip.
And no one is suggesting he’s close to returning for the final three outings of this trek.
"He won’t play (tonight)," coach Sam Mitchell said yesterday. "It’s really going to depend on how he’s feeling."
But the Raptors are not impatient. At the moment.
"We are going about it the same way we have in the past, which is with stimulation and rehabilitation and as of now, there’s no reason to think there’s anything different (to be done)," Colangelo said after the team worked out at UCLA.
The Raptors couldn’t beat the Lakers that night in Toronto with Gasol still packing in Memphis and Chris Bosh healthy on the floor. The Raptors will open a five-game Western trip tonight with a game against the Lakers, and with Gasol playing, Bosh out indefinitely with a knee injury and the bright lights of Los Angeles blinding them?
Exactly.
The trip hardly gets easier. The collective home record of their five opponents — Golden State, Sacramento, Denver and Utah are next — is 114-40 (.740). The only team with a losing record is the Sacramento Kings, and they’re 18-12 in their own building, while the Raptors are 19-13 at the Air Canada Centre.
Officially, the Raptors are looking to move up in the standings, either to catch the Cleveland Cavaliers for home advantage in the first round of the playoffs or to overtake the Orlando Magic, who are five games ahead of Toronto for the No. 3 seed. Third place would mean not only home advantage, but also a first-round matchup against the Wizards or perhaps even the Philadelphia 76ers.
But in some quarters, dropping back to the No. 6 seed and drawing Orlando is preferable to trying to stop the freight train that is the Cavaliers’ LeBron James in the first round.
So the Raptors are due for a reality check in the Western Conference, where losing games actually means something in a playoff race. That’s not the case in the East. The Raptors’ trip likely won’t be good and quite possibly will be bad, but thanks to the warm blanket of the Eastern Conference, it shouldn’t be ugly, either.
O’Neill said that he isn’t certain whether he’ll be with the team
next year.
"I make my decisions every year at the end of the year in coaching," O’Neill said.
The coach said when he changes jobs - he’s been a coach with nearly a dozen different schools - he destroys the evidence of ever being associated with the team, at least as far as his wardrobe is concerned.
"Every time I change jobs, especially when I got fired (from the Toronto Raptors), I put all my clothes from that job out front at my lake house (in upstate New York) and I invite all my prison guard friends to come over.
"We have a bonfire, we drink whiskey and have a hell of a time," O’Neill added. "I do that every time I change jobs."
The cream of the conference, the Boston Celtics and Detroit Pistons, already have clinched playoff spots, but the rest have work to do. The Toronto Raptors and Philadelphia 76ers have especially grueling stretches starting this week that could determine where and even if they play in the postseason.
Toronto starts a five-game Western Conference swing Tuesday night at the Los Angeles Lakers followed by a Wednesday game at the Golden State Warriors. They travel to Denver on Friday to face a Nuggets team desperate to get into the playoff mix, then play Saturday at the Sacramento Kings, their only game of the trip not against a playoff contender. They finish with a game Monday at the Utah Jazz.
While the Raptors are safely in the No. 5 spot in the East, a disastrous road trip could drop them to sixth or even seventh. The fact that All-Star Chris Bosh is still day-to-day with a sore knee does not help. The Raptors are 2-3 since Bosh has been out and 4-6 in the 10 games that Bosh has missed this season.
In Bosh’s absence, Rasho Nesterovic has stepped up, averaging 11.6 points and 8.2 rebounds while shooting 53% in the five games.
Top Ten Ways to Turn the ‘Soft’ Raptors to Toughies
A few weeks ago, I realized that it was almost the end of the NBA’s second trimester. In the past, we’ve doled out grades to mark the end of this period of time but this year, we’ve gone the roundtable route.
However for this edition of the roundtable, I decided to do something a bit different, and talk to some of our favourite bloggers who cover Atlantic Division teams.
-The press corners PJ Carlesimo for a good ten minutes, and he’s in a talkative mood. According to the veteran coach, Toronto can play against anyone in the West. Uh, what?!
-Over on the Toronto side, Sam Mitchell, dressed in athletic shorts and a t-shirt, is chatting up a couple of writers and discussing the battle between Hillary and Obama to win the Democratic Party’s nomination. He’s really into it, and is spouting off all kinds of stats and percentages.
-Politics are a popular topic for the Raptors today, as I find Jose Calderon discussing some big election that’s taking place in Spain today.
-Jamario Moon has taped his All-Star Weekend plaque next to the team-sanctioned one above his locker. It appears that someone enjoyed their experience in New Orleans.
-In the hallway outside the Toronto locker room, Raptors GM Bryan “Dapper Dan” Colangelo is holding court with me and three of the local writers. As we discuss some of the big trades that went down this season, Primoz Brezec walks by and he is completely drenched in sweat from the pregame warmup.
(As Brezec passes our group, he raps (loudly), “She said she wants a hood ni**a!” We all stare at each other for a few seconds trying to decipher what just happened, leading to Colangelo apologizing for the Slovenian’s gangsta ways, and everyone doubling over in laughter.)
-It should not surprise you to discover that Primoz instantly became my favorite human being on the planet following that little outburst.
-Colangelo, by the way, made it explicitly clear that our chat was strictly off the record. But know this: In those five minutes or so that we spoke, I learned more about the NBA and some of the juicy League wide back-office politics than I could have ever hoped to glean in a lifetime of following and covering the sport. Really eye-opening stuff.
18. Toronto Raptors- Robin Lopez, C/PF, Stanford. They need a C who can patrol the paint and move well, and the lesser Lopez fits that bill extremely well. Imagine an average 7′ SF/PF/C combo in the Great White North…
It’s bad news for an opposing team when Kobe Bryant says he’s going to be more aggressive.
It’s really bad news if you’re the Toronto Raptors.
Bryant said he will be more aggressive offensively to prevent the scenario that unfolded Sunday, when Sacramento’s incessant double teams limited him to two field goals in the fourth quarter and the Lakers failed to make the Kings pay from other areas of the floor.
Q&A with Jason Kapono, Toronto Raptors forward
How is it that the two-time defending NBA 3-point shooting contest winner ranks only fifth on his team in 3-pointers attempted?
Probably because teams stay home (to defend him). I don’t get the same quality looks, or teams don’t allow me to get those kinds of shots.
Who would be your strongest competition on the Raptors in a 3-point shooting contest?
It would probably be Anthony Parker. He’s been among the top five in the league the past two years in 3-point shooting. But there are a lot of guys here. All it takes it for one guy to catch on fire.
The Toronto Raptors are looking to lock up a playoff seed in the East this year, and it seems like it should be a fairly easy feat.
The Raptors are the only team in the NBA from north of the border, and Canada could not be prouder of its collective sons.
The Raptors are starting to look like a force in the East, something that hasn’t been said about the team for quite a while.
Mar 11th, 2008 at 10:58 am
Going to be interesting to see what they say is the renewal rate next year. I know for a fact 4 people around me aren’t coming back, so that’s 18 seats in a pretty small section.
They are asking us to shell out $15 more per ticket per game. No way is this team worth another $1200 dollars to me, or really, should they be to anybody.
It baffles me that they want a commitment from their “true” fanbase without any movement this year to address any needs and no talk about what they plan to do in the future.
Ever since Babcock, this franchise has been about pipe dreams and they expect people to foot the bill a la the Leafs. Well, different demo, MLSE. You are about to find out you aren’t as “special” as you think you are.
Scott’s last blog post..Linkage - March 11
Mar 11th, 2008 at 1:04 pm
i would be pissed off if i were you man. that is a lot of money with no guarantee that this team will be any better next season. maybe if they made a significant move at the deadline and got someone that filled a need, then, maybe a hike like this would be acceptable.
i don’t think talking about their future plans is enough. since bc has come on board, he has had two summers and two trading deadlines to get the right people in here, and all he has done is put shooters around bosh, not worth $1200 more for sure.
the big question is…
are you going to re-up? lol
Raps Fan’s last blog post..Raptors vs Lakers - March 11, 2008