I've always had a bit of a conflicted relationship with the Toronto Raptors.As a proud Canadian, I've wanted to see them succeed, but as a basketball purist who watched in dismay as their front office butchered move after move, year after year, GM after GM, I found them hard to stomach.
They quickly built themselves a decrepit legacy - if such a thing can manifest in 20 years - of losing. Losing young talent too early, losing large leads in the second halves of games, losing the interest of the rest of the NBA, and myself. I looked at my country's last link to the NBA kind of like Stan and Kyle do Butters on South Park; I kind of felt bad for them, and wanted the best for them, I just didn't wanna be seen hanging out with them (or mind making fun of them from time to time).
Things changed this season, after Masai Ujiri cleared up their roster with a couple simply miraculous blockbuster trades. In two fell swoops, he revitalized the Raptors' roster, by tossing two of the NBA's most egregious contracts at teams who happily forked over valuable assets. The Bargnani and Gay trades were straight pillages.
Suddenly, the Raptors were doing things like upsetting OKC on the road, and beating the Antetokounmpo out of pretty much every team in the East. Even as a somewhat-hastily-made roster of unproven youngsters, led by one of the NBA's most enigmatically challenged players, they looked like a legit team.
They rode this momentous wave of sudden success all the way to a Top-3 seed (albeit in the Leastern Conference), where I, and the rest of the NBA, were hit hard with its swell.
While it may have had something to do with the Leafs not making the Playoffs, the display put on by Toronto's fans was nothing short of incredible. The masses packing "Jurassic Park" for all seven games, and spilling into the neighboring streets to support their team, was unprecedented. Making regular appearances on US networks for the first time in over a decade, their energy was contagious, embodying a passionate credo that - even in poor grammar - our whole country could rally around.
Other arenas looked meek in comparison, Masai was out in Vince McMahon mode, Charles Barkley was loving us; for the first time in my life, I was proud to be an NBA fan in Canada. Even with Drizzy lint-rolling courtside.
Although their season's abruptly ended, the Raptors should still hang their heads high. Going up against a Playoff-tested roster who were better than their seed suggested, they fought tooth-and-claw til the very final possession. Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett - the former who blew kisses to the fans after Game 7's win, while the latter sneered, strutting over a still-flattened Kyle Lowry - praised the team and the city.
It appears as though, on several levels, the Toronto Raptors finally Made It this season; resonating enough League-wide to truly command respect. But although this team is in the hands of a competent GM for the first time perhaps ever, and at that a brilliant one, their offseason is far from straightforward.
It obviously all starts with Lowry, who up until this season had been a skilled but mercurial fringe starter for several teams that regarded his weight and attitude as mild liabilities. His contract was set to expire this year, so with a payday up for grabs, he magically shed 20 lbs and morphed into a force on both sides of the ball, has been the Raptors' de-facto Captain, and could very well end up on the All-NBA Third Team.
The Lowry Conundrum is two-fold; plenty of teams will want him this summer and are likely to drive his price up even more than his sudden career-year already has, plus there's no telling whether - with that much more money - he'll be as motivated, in shape, and cohesive as he's recently been. Lowry has always been a good player, but he wouldn't be the first - or second, or fiftieth - NBAer to conveniently blow up right before free agency, ink a fat deal, and revert to his old ways. He's going to command a deal healthily above the $10m/per range, and that's a lot of money to pay if Lowry isn't a lock to sustain this level of play.
The Raptors will also have to weather the Restricted Free Agency of Greivis Vasquez/Patrick Patterson, two vital cogs in their rotation who played up their value this year, and could be given a deal that Toronto's unwilling to match. Patterson in particular showed an aptitude for the kind of skilled, rangy power-forward play that's trending very hard in NBA circles right now.
Giving Lowry that kind of money will push them above the $50 million salary mark (Thanks, Landry Fields!) and severely handicap their ability to both upgrade other positions and re-sign Vasquez/Patterson, thus creating a void and almost-certain downgrade at two bench spots. It's definitely the riskier proposition to ink Lowry, but he's appeared to have a breakthrough in Toronto, and at this level, if it's sustainable, he's worth almost every penny.
Another question will be the impeding expiry of Amir Johnson's suddenly-bargain contract. After next season at $7million, he'll be due at least a slight raise, and is another promising piece that Ujiri could easily Jedi-trade instead of committing to long-term.
Jonas Valanciunas showed a somewhat-disappointing lack of growth this season after dominating Summer League, but it wasn't entirely shocking. Jonas is - very evidently - a player who thrives off of touches; when he gets the ball, he feels involved, and the confidence permeates to the other parts of his game. The Raps' surprise success this year with guard-heavy play forced their hand away from giving Valanciunas much of an offensive role, so his efforts suffered in other areas.
Throughout the Brooklyn series for exmaple, whenever he ran a pick-and-roll with Lowry, the Nets were able to break through his listless screen and double the ball, while Jonas - as aware as Brooklyn that he wasn't being passed to - jogged non-threateningly towards the net. After a Game 1 in which he punished BK's weak interior, he mostly vanished from the series in a disconnected fog. Encouragingly, Jonas will be working out with Hakeem Olajuwon this summer - the NBA Center's version of investment counseling from Warren Buffett or asshole lessons from Donald Sterling. Expect his sometimes-suspect footwork and fluidity (JV leads all big men in Forced Bad Shots-after-Hesitating On Open Looks) to be more polished next year, and for him to command more of a role, potentially reducing the need for as much scoring from the perimeter.
The Raptors could also have room to re-tool, with as much as $20+million in cap space, should Vasquez, Patterson, and Lowry be let go. Again, they were vital to this year's success, but they also played their market values up (tremendously in Lowry and Patterson's cases). One of the implications of keeping this team intact at the Trade Deadline was inevitable: break them up or likely overpay to retain them. Masai clearly calculated that risk, and may still be able to convert sign-and-trade assets out of any offer he doesn't feel like matching. Remember, this team wasn't supposed to be this good, and the current roster was assembled with future flexibility, not "Win Now", in mind.
A season where Toronto rose to the top of East's Shit-Heap (they'd have missed the Playoffs in the West) produced a massive ripple of enthusiasm for a team that tortured its fans with brutal management for most of two decades. The city, the country, hell most of the NBA loved this team, and the raucous standing ovation they exited to Sunday afternoon was justified, and a long time in the making.
The reality though, is that this roster that caught lightning in a bottle, could be a flash in the pan. The optimism brimming from the Raptors' exit pressers on Monday indicated a tightly-bound unity that was almost blissfully ignorant of the shakeups that are likely headed their way. The Raptors could look much different next season, with plenty of cards to play, and a living incarnation of ESPN's Trade Machine running their team.
But for Toronto fans who've grown used to shuddering at the changes they've made over the years, and might be hesitant to see maybe their best team ever attempt to evolve, remember just how quickly this all came to fruition, and trust the guy who made it all happen to help the Raptors go even further.
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