Arsenalist

Shhhh….(whispering) if you listen closely you can hear it. Shhhh….there it is..it’s the sound of nothing happening in Raptorland. It’s what the off-season is made of and results in a void around these areas for long stretches at a time. But nay! I wow to keep the train chugging along despite the lack of activity or rumour in the Raptors camp. It makes for quite a pathetic read but we’re like meth addicts, we need something…anything.

Since there’s no Raptors news this morning, I found it quite apropos to start off with the Chris Paul contract extension which stands at $68M/4yrs for 17 million a year. Even in the inflated NBA market that is superstar money indeed. If we sign Calderon to an 8M/yr deal it doesn’t sound like overpayment at all. In fact, if I was Calderon I’d hold the Raptors feet to the fire and ask for even more money since we don’t have a backup plan at PG anymore. Hell, I’d start the bidding at 13M and settle at 10M if I were him, you think Colangelo has the balls to let Calderon walk at this point?

I don’t want to scare anybody but the Celtics are talking about getting Maggette (Spurs hunt). If that’s not enough, Josh Smith might end up in Philadelphia. New Jersey’s retooling and will have a young athletic product on the court which leaves the Knicks as the only team that I can confidently say that we’ll finish ahead of next year.

Chris Duhon gets a 12M/2yrs contract with the Knicks, that’s 6M per year. You can’t possibly tell me Calderon is only 2M/yr better than Duhon. There is a Raptors connection to this (very lame one), Duhon was signed to an offersheet by Rob Babcock but the Bulls matched it paving the way for the TJ Ford trade a year later. The most interesting story is the one suggesting that the Warriors have been contacted by nine different teams about sign-and-trade offers for Monta Ellis who thinks his future is away from the bay area. Insert sentence which drools over Monta Ellis in a Raptors uniform. On another guard note, Keyon Dooling is likely done in Orlando as they signed Courtney Lee to a contract.

Ontario’s debating whether they should allow Vegas-style gambling and MLSE doesn’t care either way. The opinion of this insignificant observer is that how could it possibly hurt? There’s lots to gain in this proposition including more tourism and increased business; I can’t see the OLGC being opposed to this as long as they’re the major shareholder of the “house”.

Toronto stole some NFL games from the Bills so the least the city of Buffalo could do was try to snatch some NBA games away from us - good luck! Unless MLSE’s getting 90% of the ticket sales that’s highly unlikely to happen. On a similar note the Raptors are holding their training camp at Carleton University.

Leo Rautins and Canada are off to a rocky start with a shocking loss to New Zealand. The shocking part wasn’t the loss but the fact that New Zealand actually had a basketball team. As long as Leo keeps on stressing how vital it is to keep the ball inbounds when blocking a shot I think we’ll be fine.

I have a confession to make, I am a D.I.S.C.O Dancer.

Let’s start off with Ron Artest. Quote from Monday:

“Not opting out, the Kings have been there for me, so the best I could do is stay in my contract.”

Quote from Tuesday:

“I don’t see myself with [the] Kings beyond 2008-09. I think I made the biggest mistake by staying in my contract and I have to live with it.”

‘Nuf said about how volatile this guy is.

As mentioned yesterday and further confirmed today, Jose Calderon has signed a new deal and we’re also going to be bringing in Roko Ukic over. No surprises there. We know what we’re getting in Calderon and what he’s capable of, the only question is whether he can continue to do what he’s been doing but as a full-time starter having full responsibility of the team. I have a fear of NBA scouts ever since the Bargnani thing, let’s hope Calderon can overcome the attention and detail with which coaches and scouts will look at him. With the inexperienced Ukic backing him up you expect Calderon to play high minutes and that automatically means that at some point he’ll get burned out and get into a 10-20 game shooting slump so be prepared for it.

Over the last two years the Raptors have been successful when their bench play has been strong, in our division winning year the Forderon duo was our key advantage, last year whenever we got key contributions from Carlos Delfino or Andrea Bargnani, we gave ourselves a great chance to win. With TJ Ford gone, our already shallow bench has taken a hit and we’re compensating for it by shortening our roster. Colangelo’s trying to concentrate the talent on the roster and force Mitchell to create a consistent rotation with well-defined roles. I think this is a great move by Colangelo who sees that last year’s unpredictable substitution patterns, sporadic playing time and illogical coaching decisions cost the Raptors plenty of games. He’s setting the table for Sam Mitchell to prove himself as a coach who is not just a motivator, but someone who when given talent can make it show on the court.

I suspect the freestyling nature of the Raptors offense isn’t going to be tolerated next year, Mitchell will have to use his brains to figure out ways to manage Calderon’s minutes, ensure Bosh/O’Neal cohesion, reduce Bosh/O’Neal redundancy, hide Bargnani’s defense at SF, showcase Bargnani offensively, utilize Kapono’s shooting ability, take advantage of Humphries’ hustle, put Calderon in situations where he has options and most of all manage expectations of players so there are no surprises game in and game out. Once we have the political situation of the team taken care of and every player is on the same page, only then can we hope the talent and potential of this team to shine through to whatever degree it can.

The Raptors still have the MLE to throw at a player so we should expect a signing at some point in the summer, hopefully a SF. It’s starting to look like Colangelo’s done acquiring pedestrian talent only to see Sam Mitchell retrofit a roster into a style of play. If we can establish an 8-man rotation and use the DL for what it’s actually designed for, we’ll start to see consistency on this team, regardless of talent level. This should in turn help our defense because it’s on defense that teamwork shows and trust amongst teammates mandated. When the same players play together more often, they automatically develop a better understanding of what each others’ tendencies and capabilities are and are likely to adjust better.

The Clippers couldn’t acquire TJ Ford or DJ Augustin but they managed to get their hands on Baron Davis. This is a bit of a shock as Golden State was giving all indications that Davis was their franchise player. With Davis is headed out, it puts even more impetus on the Warriors to resign their free agents including Mickael Pietrus who’d look good in a Raptors uniform. On another free agent note, did you know Damon Stoudamire is an unrestricted free agent? Emotional homecoming, I can already picture it.

The Raptors have also signed Hassan Adams from to a 1yr/400K contract. The defensive-minded guard played in Europe last season and registered 61 games for the Nets in 07-08, you might remember him from the playoffs of that year too. Not the signings I was hoping given the 2008 NBA Free Agent List. There are a few players that the Raptors could consider: Ricky Davis, Gordan Giricek and most importantly Jarvis Hayes. I’ve always liked Hayes’ game, he’s a solid defensive minded SF that doesn’t mind getting to the rim and can hit the 3. Tayshaun Prince has got the stranglehold on the SF minutes in Detroit so Hayes is likely on the move with interest from Phoenix already there.

There’s also the need to address Anthony Parker who I’ve always suspected is capable of being an NBA 2-guard as long as there’s enough distractions for the defense to worry about. It’s when you start consistently running double-screen fadeaways for Parker and look to him to carry you through quarters that things go awry. His clutch record doesn’t help matters either but with O’Neal and Bosh around you’d think 3-point shooters are a premium and Parker is definitely that. With only the MLE at our disposal and both a SF and a SG need to fill, I suspect we’re going to aim for the SF since Parker is the lesser of the two problems.

It’s a long summer, too long.

Tuesday marks the first day of free agency and the Raptors have but one call to make. It’s to Jose Calderon offering him at least $40 million over 5 years. I suspect this deal to get done fairly quickly, after all Bryan Colangelo doesn’t trade Ford without having some assurance that Calderon’s demands aren’t too extravagant to not be met. We’ll end up paying Jose a lot of money and then proceed to bitch about it if/when he gets burned out by Mitchell who’ll be forced to play him 37 minutes a game because we won’t acquire a backup PG and/or if Ukic isn’t able to fill in adequately . Here’s hoping Calderon’s performances stay at least on par and his defense improves enough so that Bosh/O’Neal don’t spend their time clogging lanes left open by Jose.

There are also unconfirmed reports that Roko Ukic has signed a two year contract with the Raptors. It only makes sense. I figure we’ll see something more official in the next couple days.

Update: Calderon staying according to his website, no numbers yet:

“Early this morning, through my agents, I reached a preliminary agreement with the Toronto Raptors. I want to thank Bryan Colangelo, Maurizio Gherardini, Sam Mitchell and all of the Raptors family for the confidence that they have placed in me. I am sure that together we are going to achieve big things in the future.”

Add Kelly Dwyer to the Bryan Colangelo fanboy list. He’s very irked that two Toronto newspapers had the audacity to second-guess Colangelo’s wheelings and dealing of the past couple years and suggest that Colangelo could very well be an average NBA GM (this of course set off khandor). I wonder how long Colangelo will milk that division title which we happened to win the year the Atlantic was part of the NBDL. The article also calls for a Leave Britney BC Alone video.

Dwyer does bring a good point up, it’s up to Sam Mitchell to use Jermaine O’Neal effective and if he can’t, the Raptors should eat the rest of Mitchell’s contract and get themselves a coach that knows how to use what he’s given. The Raptors have to make sure that Jermaine O’Neal’s offensive game complements Bosh and doesn’t take anything away from it. Bosh should never be starved of shots and O’Neal’s role should be well-defined enough so that combined with Bosh they can create a threat which will open up the rest of our offense, not create two black holes. Last season’s player utilization was hard to watch with the sub patters of Kapono, Bargnani, Humphries and Rasho all open for criticism. Not to mention how Sam got away with Kapono hitting only three threes in two months. Ugh, disgusting. Colangelo will not stand for anything similar with Jermaine O’Neal since he’s on a short two year contract in which results are expected.

Ladies and gentleman, I present to you the Toronto Raptors second round draft history:

1995, #35 - Jimmy King, Michigan
1998, #47 - Tyson Wheeler, Rhode Island
1999, #46 - DeeAndre Hulett, USBL
2003, #52 - Remon Van de Hare, FC Barcelona
2004, #40 - Albert Miralles, Spain
2005, #41 - Roko Ukic, Croatia
2005, #58 - Uros Slokar, Slovenia
2006, #35 - PJ Tucker, Texas
2008, #41 - Nathan Jawai, Australia

Two things to point out, the only good piece that ever came out of this lot is Roko Ukic and we have Rob Babcock to thank for that one. As you can see, expectations should be very low for anything we pick up in the second round so there’s no disappointment in what we got. The annoyance of this pick isn’t in the pick itself but in the fact that CDR - an athletic defensive minded SF - was taken right before us. The Raptors weren’t proactive enough in trying to get something out of this draft and failed to even partially address a very obvious need - athleticism.

Ron Artest is not opting out of his contract with the Kings. Ron Ron says the Kings have “been there for me”. How very romantic. The real reason of course is that he knows no team will pay him more than the $8M he’s making now and he doesn’t want to play for a contender for less money. I mean, if the Kings were “there” for you, why not just outright say you won’t be opting out at the end of the season. These athletes really piss me off sometime. Emotions aside, when the season ended I wanted the Raptors to acquire Ron Artest in a trade and draft Brandon Rush. 0-2 there.

The Wizards resigned Antawn Jamison for 4yrs/50m which is fair market value for him. Applause for Ernie Grunfeld. Wait a minute though, he’s talking about giving Gilbert Arenas a 100 million dollar contract which will ensure that the Wizards never get past the second round for the next decade. If ever there was an opportunity to sign-and-trade somebody, this is it. If Grunfeld actually gives him the deal after he blackmailed the Wizards by threatening to leave unless Jamison got his contract, it’ll show how owners and GMs are absolute slaves to players. Arenas single-handedly lost the Cleveland series and he gets rewarded with a deal. Blah!

Now if you read this space fairly regularly you must know what I think of those imbeciles over at The Bleacher Report. This time their “analysis” of our draft has this to say:

The addition of Jermaine O’Neal is either going to be a hit or miss for the Toronto Raptors. In my opinion the Raptors got the worse end of this trade. Although they got better in size including the addition of Roy Hibbert they got nothing at the guard position.

Piss off. Seriously. Stop writing and sell that domain to a company selling bleachers.

Stuck in Vancouver till Thursday night. Watching American History X again, sick movie. Might give TauEpsilonNu’s idea a second thought.

I’m in Vancouver for work. So here’s a cop-out post containing highlights of the future Raptors Hall of Famer:

Better post later (maybe?):

Highlights:

Highlights:

Interview:

Warriors Pre-draft Interview:

Jazz Pre-draft Interview:

NBA Draft Aussie Prospects:

Let’s look at the changes to our roster so far:

Additions: Roko Ukic, Jermaine O’Neal, Nathan Jawai
Subtractions: TJ Ford, Rasho Nesterovic, Maceo Baston, Carlos Delfino

Bryan Colangelo is working towards having a “nice, lean roster” for next year which sounds like a good enough idea. What he doesn’t mention is having an athletic roster that is capable of providing consistent defensive stops and can play man-defense out on the perimeter without needing help from the paint. As you recall against the Magic, we got undone because of guard and small forward penetration. And as you might also recall, we were poor at close-outs and interior and perimeter rotations all season long. None of that has been addressed yet and granted the summer is long, however, we don’t have the resources to fix this team.

Good defensive news first: There is a defensive silver-lining to the Jermaine O’Neal trade and its his ability to play help defense. Consider this scenario: The opposing guard just beat Calderon to the paint. Pause. Last year Bosh came and helped out leaving the weak side wide open for any opposing player to step in for a layup or foul. Next year Bosh can actually come out and help his guards whilst feeling confident that Jermaine O’Neal is there to back him up and not leaving him out to dry (shake head at Bargnani). So see, the trade actually helped us on both ends of the floor.

Back to the issue at hand though, what do we need to do to become lean, athletic and a better defensive team in a strong East. The bad news is that we’ll only have about $5-$6 million to spend after paying all our existing players, this of course assuming that we want to stay under the salary cap which is going to be known in July. Speaking realistically and glancing at the 2008 NBA Free Agent list, you’ll notice that there aren’t any quick fixes to this problem. Sure there’s Mickael Pietrus, Josh Childress and J.R. Smith but throwing the MLE at them is hardly going to prevent their teams from matching the offer (assuming they sign the offer-sheet). There’s also Bonzi Wells who happens to be an unrestricted free agent but I’d rather have Jamario Moon.

There’s also Ron Artest who might opt out of his contract with the Kings. But unless him and Jermaine O’Neal shared the same bed on road-trips, I hardly see him picking the Raptors over other suitors like the Lakers. This one’s a no-brainer. This leaves us with fulfilling our needs via trade and now that TJ Ford and Rasho’s expiring contract are no more, we’re left with the likes of Jason Kapono, Joey Graham, Anthony Parker and Kris Humphries as trade bait. Aside from Jason Kapono there isn’t anything here to get excited about and frankly, I’d rather keep Kapono here and see what he can do with two double-team threats on the team. A contending team or two might be interested in Parker for his veteran presence and mid-range game but that’s about it. That’s all the ammunition we have. All that’s left is to figure out who is desperate enough to take our 5M MLE and run with it. Don’t you get the feeling we didn’t get enough out of this draft?

The more and more you think about it the more you’ll realize that next season, much like last season, will be dependent on what Andrea Bargnani can do for us and how well he can guard his position. If he’s able to play the SF effectively for 15-20 minutes a game, it’ll change the entire dynamics of the Raptors. If he can become more of a slashing type player, our problems will decrease because he has the ability to create off the dribble and get opponents into foul trouble. If he can have a Toni Kukoc type impact on this team, we can aim for home court in the first round.

There’s also the issue of guard defense. I haven’t seen nearly enough of Roko Ukic to say whether he can effectively spell Calderon through the course of a season. At 6′ 5″, I am hoping his defense is better than Calderon’s and that he can remedy some of our penetration issues. I thought Keyon Dooling would’ve been a nice signing for us because of his hounding defensive play and ability to knock down shots. Then again you have to give Ukic a shot and see just exactly what he can do, he’s 24 and not getting any younger.

There is one player that I haven’t give up on yet: Joey Graham. Before you close the window, consider this: When has Graham gotten any consistent playing time under Sam Mitchell? Never. Has he been afforded the same leeway has Jamario Moon, Anthony Parker, Andrea Bargnani or even Carlos Delfino? No. His trade value is practically zero so you’re not going to get anything for him on the market but he can still give us something. We tend to forget that he’s a strong, athletic player that when playing with confidence, can slash to the rim, grab rebounds, play hard and when the lighting is right, knock mid-range jumpers down. I’m not even looking at him for offense, I think he can help us defensively and needs to be given a fair shot in training cap and at the start of the season. Call me crazy.

Note to those of you who would’ve loved to see Gerald Wallace on the Raptors, here’s the game tally for his career: 54, 47, 37, 70, 55, 72 and 62. Sure he puts up good numbers but its while playing for a terrible team. You can’t expect him to replicate those numbers here and for what its worth, defensively, I’ll take Moon over him any day.

The Raptors get a 8/10 for their draft according to Yahoo Sports. Figure that one out.

Have a nice weekend.

First off, thanks to everybody who participated in the live draft blog, those who stayed through the whole 5 hours and the ones who swung by for 20 minutes. It was fun.

After a night of wheeling and dealing in New York where the Raptors were hardly involved in anything, there is a new light being shone on the TJ Ford for Jermaine O’Neal trade and it’s this: We were most definitely overvaluing the 17th pick to a degree almost dangerous. The fact is that Donte Greene (#28) and CDR’s (#40) stock fell so low that picking them with the 17th pick would’ve been ludicrous. Brandon Rush’s stock rose so high that he became a lottery pick at #13, well beyond our reach. Even Robin Lopez was out of our reach as he went #15.

When our pick finally came Roy Hibbert was still available and I suppose you could make a case that it would’ve been wise for us to draft him (assuming the O’Neal trade hadn’t been made) and address our rebounding need. However, I’d much rather have Jermaine O’Neal than Hibbert simply because he’s a legit former All-Star, lends credibility to the franchise, increases our PINP numbers and provides Bosh help. The way O’Neal’s been talking it looks like he’s over his injuries and that the rest and rehab have done the work. I’m willing to roll the dice with him knowing that there’s no way we could’ve landed the prized Brandon Rush in the draft. Anyway, here’s O’Neal’s quote:

“They have a ton of talent…When I sat out all those games last year, it was a career move, I knew what the situation was. I knew what the significance of me staying away from the game, rehabbing the leg and getting the knee back to its normal usage was. “I think playing alongside Chris Bosh gives us a different dynamic. You look at teams in the NBA, you look at their low-post players, and they always have one good player, and when that good player goes out, you can change your defence a little bit and load up on other areas. Even with us starting out the games together, one of us will always be on the floor. You won’t get a chance to adjust your defence.”

From the same article a mysterious source reported that we could’ve done a Gerald Wallace for TJ Ford deal and retained our 17th pick - more on that here.

The heartbreak of the night had to be CDR being taken with the 40th pick just before Indiana’s selection on our behalf. Those c*nty Nets traded Richard Jefferson and replaced him with CDR and Yi, shrewd indeed. I don’t think the Raptors were targeting someone in particular and were content on just about anybody falling to them, that’s the only thing that can explain us taking Nathan Jawai - the Aussie Shaq - despite having a plethora of big men. We also passed on Bill Walker in the second round who eventually wound up being taken by Washington and traded to the Celtics. The second round was marred by our inability to get more athletic despite some good, serviceable players available.

This is probably a good segue to the Dave Feshuk piece today which hints that Bryan Colangelo isn’t all that he’s cranked up to be and that the O’Neal trade is almost an act of desperation.

Indiana had a great draft, adding Brandon Rush and Roy Hibbert to a team with TJ Ford, Danny Granger and Mike Dunleavy means they’ve got a nucleus they can build around and maybe rise to semi-contention within a year or two. What’s funny about Brandon Rush is that his and CDR’s games were constantly compared during the pre-draft camps, workouts and just about everywhere else. But once it was all said and done, 27 picks separated the two - a true testament to how good he can be and how clueless us fans really are.

There were many athletic players available in the late first round and early second round but the Raptors chose to remain dormant. They might regret this inactivity because Bill Walker and CDR could’ve easily been had, the latter with minimal amount of maneuvering. As it is, the Raptors select Nathan Jawai, another center who is expected to play for us next year. Bringing him over means he’ll be the fourth string big man behind O’Neal, Bargnani and Humphries. Adding another big man to the roster while not addressing the SF position means that its more and more likely that if Bargnani wants consistent playing time it’s going to happen at the 3 (topic for another day). Didn’t quite understand this pick but it is what it is, a second round pick and if you look at the history of Raptors drafting they’ve never actually come out with anything remotely good in the second round.

Mike Miller who a lot of Raptors fans had an eye on is on the move to Minnesota for a package involving O.J Mayo. The Knick fans soundly booed the selection of Danilo Gallinari, the fear of him being the next Andrea Bargnani is just too much to bear. The Houston Rockets drafted Frenchman Nicolas Batum and promptly shipped him over for Joey Dorsey who in this observer’s opinion will be a rebounding stalwart for years to come.

There’s no doubt that this was a draft with some great athletes, some surefire good players and some sleepers. What makes me feel better about giving up our pick is that the player I valued most was gone four spots earlier. That’s my saving grace. We’ve rolled the dice on Jermaine O’Neal, our hopes of contending next season rely solely upon his health, how well he plays with Bosh and whether our shooters can get cleaner looks. This draft was an opportunity to get more athletic and better our perimeter defense which we failed to do. Bryan Colangelo’s perception of the draft couldn’t have been that great, at least not as good as Portland’s or Houston’s, two contending teams who felt that this was an opportunity to better themselves and made moves which improved them. The Raptors were content with Jermaine O’Neal. Hopefully they’ve just deferred the improvement of this team to summer signings and trades because this can’t be it.

As of right now our roster simply cannot run the break and get easy points nor can we defend the perimeter. It’s not like with TJ Ford we were Phoenix East, but replacing him with O’Neal who is strictly a half-court player and putting the ultra-cautious Calderon at the helm slows our offense down to an absolute crawl. Roko Ukic, if brought in, might be able to change that to some degree but I hope Colangelo realizes that this team will need to be better in the half-court sets and for that you need a creative X’s and O’s coach, which we all know Mitchell isn’t.

I can live with us being a half-court team that runs everything through Calderon => Bosh or Calderon => O’Neal, but at some point we’ll have to address our perimeter defense and athleticism and it better happen this summer, otherwise this mega-trade is all for naught.

Once again, thanks for swinging by last night.

It actually appears to have happened. TJ Ford along with our prized 17th pick and the expiring contract of Rasho Nesterovic for Jermaine O’Neal. Rasho’s obviously thrown in for salary reasons and is easily the third best piece that the Raptors are giving up in the trade. Whether the best piece is TJ Ford or the 17th pick is up for debate.

The trade is designed to increase our post-scoring, make us stronger on the glass (3rd worst in the league) and is an attempt to build a formidable frontline which will attract more double teams thus allowing our shooters more open looks. If all parties in this trade were 100% healthy, the preliminary “winner” of the trade would easily by Toronto. However, given Ford and O’Neal’s injury histories, only time will tell who won this trade. My money’s on Indiana. Ford happens to be 4 years younger than O’Neal who is 29 and although Ford’s injuries have been serious, they’ve been of the “freaky” type having to do with stingers and aggravations. He basically had one injury and fully recovered from it. O’Neal’s injuries appear to be much more chronic in nature and have a higher chance of resurfacing once again - groin, back and knee. The Raptors are definitely taking on more risk here by putting their eggs in O’Neal’s basket.

Then there’s the matter of giving up the 17th pick in a deep draft. You could argue that the draft combined with TJ Ford provided us an opportunity to fulfill two needs: wing scoring and rebounding. However, we’ve packaged both of our best summer assets and a serviceable center for one player and passed up the opportunity to have a shot at some solid players that are slated to go in the teens in the draft. Granted, it’s early and we could trade our way back into the first round but I don’t see many teams willing to give up their first round picks this year. The pick to me is the hardest thing to give up here because there’s just so much bloody potential out there.

Then there’s the question of salary. O’Neal just became the highest paid Raptor and if God forbid he injures himself and ends up playing 40 games this year, his trade value come summertime will be zilch. That’s 20 million tied up in salary for the 2009-10 season! There’s no doubt that this deal has to a degree handcuffed the Raptors in terms of future trades and signings.

In every sports trade, trade is an element of risk involved and whether the risk needs to be mitigated eventually defines whether the trade is successful or not. If O’Neal puts up 20 and 10 like he did for almost 5 seasons in a row and we win 52 games next year, everybody will applaud this move. If he fails to deliver and doesn’t mix-in well with Bosh and the Raptors continue with their mediocrity, whats the point? When you give up on young talent as the Raptors have in this trade, be prepared to be scrutinized for years to come whenever the player in question is doing well. Before it was Charlie Villanueva, now it’s TJ Ford.

The impact on Bargnani won’t be as severe as you would think - we did give up Rasho in the trade and his minutes should be distributed according to player form. Rasho’s career average in MPG is 23 while O’Neal’s is 28. That’s a five minute difference which isn’t hard to live with for Bargnani and should motivate him to play harder now that there’s more competition. If the talk of Rasho returning after being waived is true, then Bargnani is in serious trouble.

The Raptors acquiring a legitimate starting center in a trade speaks volumes as to what the franchise thinks of Andrea Bargnani. Either they’re prepared to give up on him and traded for an insurance policy (ironic given JO’s health) or they see Bargnani playing the SF position thus giving the Raptors a very big frontline and an advantage on paper (although the Orlando series exposed him like never before). The trade should serve as an ultimatum to Bargnani that he should be prepared to battle in training camp and practice if he wants to see any minutes past garbage time. The other way to look at it is that Colangelo feels that Bargnani is still two more years away from realizing his potential and needs to play second fiddle to O’Neal during this time while learning in the process. Is this trade Colangelo acknowledging his mistake of drafting Bargnani? Not yet, this is simply a change of strategy.

The most glaring aspect of this trade is that we’ve handed our PG responsibilities to Jose Calderon without a certified backup on the roster. Calderon has as many defensive issues (if not more) than Ford and is as liable as going into a scoring drought as Ford. He does happen to be a better fit for the Raptors given his holding style of play which suits our “offense” much better. This isn’t a knock on TJ, he happens to need more athletic, alert, fast-break type players to be successful. Calderon doesn’t, he’s willing to patrol the three point line and be patient with Bosh on posts and re-posts while there’s inconsequential movement on the weak side. To put it in simpler terms, TJ Ford’s a Don Nelson/Mike D’Antoni player. Nothing wrong with it, except we’re not nearly as up-tempo, exciting, fast-breaking or athletic as players in those systems need to be.

The final word on the trade: We gave up too much and took on the greater risk. We gave up the younger player with less chronic injuries, a valuable teen pick in a deep draft and the expiring contract of a good center for a player who was great 4 years ago. I’d feel far more comfortable if we hadn’t given up the pick but at some point you have to prove to Chris Bosh that you’re trying to win.

Here’s hoping the Raptors do some maneuvering and somehow come out with Brandon Rush tonight. On the other hand, if Rush or CDR are gone by the time our Indiana’s pick rolls around, Colangelo needs to be given some credit for predicting that and using the pick’s value in a trade.

Check AltRaps.com for links relating to the story, here’s one however and its Colangelo talking about the trade and how letting Ford go was a foregone conclusion reached by both parties.

“There was discussion with T.J. at the end of the season and also with his agents or representatives since the end of the season where we amicably discussed the scenario that might play out where he might be part of a trade and he’s comfortable with that”.

Note: Live Blogging tonight for the draft starting at 6:30PM on RaptorsNation.org. I’ve never tried to do this before so we’ll see how it goes. Try to swing by so I don’t look like a fool. Thanks!

Let’s start off the day with Chad Ford’s mock draft which insists on us taking Robin Lopez at #17. I don’t see it happening unless Brandon Rush, CDR or even Donte Greene are already taken. There’s no doubt that drafting a hustle-type big man is the easier thing to do, there’s far less expectations from a banger than from a scoring talent and also a greater sense of assurance about what you’re getting. Rebounding is Need #1 but wing scoring and defense is #1a. As evidenced by the rumours, we’re looking for a big man via trade so it makes sense that the draft is there for a young winger. Anyway, we’ll find out tomorrow.

Doug Smith points out 7 players we’re closely looking at of which 5 are big men. Rush and CDR and nowhere to be found. I highly doubt the Raptors will tell Smith or anyone for that matter who they’re looking at. Take the list with a bucket load of salt. He’s also saying the deal to Phoenix remains “very much alive”.

The Jermaine O’Neal trade talk when combined with speculation that we might go big in the draft leaves us with one question: What does this do with Andrea Bargnani? Has Colangelo given up on him and is already hunting for a C replacement? Is he planning on moving him to the three so rebounding is less of a responsibility? Michael Grange tries to answer questions like these and suggests that Colangelo might be closer to giving up on him than before. In my opinion, the first 20 games of the season will tell us exactly where Bargnani is and whether those intimate sessions with John Lucas worked or not. Until then, I’ll hold judgment but I’ll say this: If he doesn’t get it done in the first half of next season, I see no reason not to trade him and publicly admit the mistake.

From Indiana’s perspective only two players are untouchable: Granger and Dunleavy. The rest are available (even Tinsley) as long as you give them something they can use now. Larry Bird doesn’t appear to be too fond of rebuilding from the ground-up, he’s all about applying patches and hoping they stick. Since Indiana’s already picking at #11 its somewhat surprising that they’ll also be in the hunt for a pick 6 spots further down. They’re looking to swing trades and something tells me their interest in our pick is only because they want to package it with another trade.

The Knicks are up for trading practically anybody on their roster as long as it gets them a shot at O.J Mayo. Donnie Walsh is crazy enough to try to acquire Shawn Marion (who makes $1.3 billion) just to re-unite him with Mike D’Antoni. I see the Knicks are fully in pursuit of mediocrity. I think our new slogan should be: The Toronto Raptors: Hey, at least we’re not the Knicks.

The Pistons are reportedly trying to acquire Baron Davis which would leave a PG void in Golden State and we know how much Don Nelson loves T.J Ford. But as I said yesterday, there’s absolutely no one on the Warriors that is even worth looking at who is not labeled as untouchable or is a free agent.

In ex-Raptors news, Jorge Garbajosa has signed with his former club Unicaja for next season. This after he turned down offers from CSKA Moscow and Real Madrid. Not surprisingly, no NBA teams were in the mix.

Have a nice one.

We all know TJ Ford is going to get traded but that doesn’t mean you have to print a picture like this of him in the Toronto Star. It’s like they went through every image of Ford they could find and picked the worse one possible. BTW, I love newspapers - always a day late in their reporting.

The Indiana deal is dead and the reason isn’t the 17th pick, its concerns over TJ Ford and Jermaine O’Neal’s health. Fair enough, both sides would’ve done this deal with an element of reluctance and fear of coming out on the wrong side of a gamble. On the surface TJ Ford’s injuries seem to be less chronic than Jermaine O’Neal’s although both are probably one play away from having their career’s killed, but then again who isn’t.

TJ Ford and Leandro Barbosa are also on the Knicks radar according to Donnie Walsh who wants to get himself a new PG on or before draft night. In the same story we’re told that Jorge Garbajosa might sign for CSKA Moscow - good luck to the lad. Also according to this article, Anthony Parker is said to be considering Olympiakos and has their offer “in his mind”. Now I’m not one to cite another blog as a “source” but here goes anyway: Delfino is also said to have interest from Europe. Don’t put it past his agent to cook stories up just to increase his worth on the market. Also, the Raptors are apparently anxious to “revamp the roster”. This paragraph should suffice for the BS portion of this post.

According to Michael Grange there was no “next Jamario Moon” to be found at this year’s free agent camp. Tamar Slay and Rod Benson picked up some cred but as far as being invited to training or summer camp, no luck there. Yet.

Dave Feschuk tells us that Matt Bonner’s getting married in Toronto but the story is inappropriately titled “Return of the Red Rocket” when it really should be “Return of the Red Rocket because he’s getting married here and then returning to wherever he’s playing now”.

Our man Brandon Rush leads off USA Today’s look at the best young guards in this year’s draft. The more I read about him, the more I want like him on this team. He seems to be a guy who appreciates the prestige of playing in the NBA and won’t get caught up in the “playing in Canada” bullshit. His knee injury has given him a very fresh perspective on basketball and has made him into a truly hardworking player, not just someone who relies on talent exclusively.

Chris Bosh is pumped up for the Beijing Games, great, just don’t get injured. That would seriously suck and put a damper on the season. Even if he tweaks his knee just a little, that means 10 games without him which means at best a 2-8 record.

Thanks for swinging by.

Update: Deal goes down!

The Indianapolis Star is reporting. This is also confirmed (copied?) by Doug Smith.

Obviously we’re taking a big gamble if this goes down but I’m all for the proactive nature of this deal, once again giving up the #17 pick hurts but I wouldn’t be terribly upset at this move. O’Neal’s game tally over the last four seasons is 44, 51, 69 and 42. Not exactly iron man numbers but sometimes you have to be willing to take a risk to make the team better. O’Neal (when healthy) does provide front-court scoring and rebounding which is welcome on the Raptors any day.

Trading away the #17 pick doesn’t necessarily mean we don’t get a shot at Roy Hibbert or Rush, another trade could always be engineered to grab a pick. However, given the limited number of resources at BC’s disposal, its going to be hard to get back in the first round after we lose Rasho and TJ Ford. Again, giving up Rasho is understandable since the salaries must match (O’Neal makes 20m + for two more years) but that #17 pick doesn’t sit right. As I’ve said before, there is some talent in the teens this year.

This trade will also make O’Neal the highest paid Raptor. Anyway, while the trade rumours are swirling there’s also talk of the Raptors going big in Thursday’s draft. Nicolas Batum is out of the picture and if the article is to be believed, so are CDR and Brandon Rush. To be honest, there’s absolutely nothing worth believing in any media outlet including newspapers, radio, blogs or TV. Nobody will tell you what they’ll be doing in the draft (makes total sense) and there’s no point in mulling and losing your hair over smokescreens.

Here’s a fact though: the Warriors have to make a trade by June 30th if they want to use the 10M exception they received in the Richardson deal. Monta Ellis and Andris Biedrins are off-limits which leaves the Warriors with hardly any trade pieces. With Baron Davis firmly instilled as the franchise player and Pietrus and Barnes free agents, there’s nothing the Raptors would like from that roster and TJ Ford would be a hard sell there.

More workouts scheduled on Monday D.J. White, Vlad Kuljanin, J.J. Hickson, Josh Duncan, Ryan Bell and Jaycee Carroll.

Chris Bosh makes Team USA, this means Tyson Chandler got squeezed out. I’d much rather see him rest and be fresh for the season because as a football fan I’m all too aware of injuries suffered to players on international duty which prevented them from fulfilling club obligations. On the other hand when your country calls, you better answer.

Kosta Koufus is compared to Andrea Bargnani.

Later.