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Everything Round 2: Toronto Raptors vs Cleveland Cavaliers

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  • Maury wrote: View Post
    Why keep this group together if they are gonna get blown apart by the cavs every year?
    Because they may not. Again, regular season caveats aside, this was a 5th (tied) place team in a thirty team league that went through a rough stretch of injuries and played well for half a season with a not yet ready rookie at PF (as opposed to Ibaka). Maybe next year we're the 1st or 2nd seed and we don't face the cavs til the ECF. Or maybe the cavs stumble and get knocked out earlier. Or maybe the clock finally turns on Lebron and the team is nothing. You have to have a seat at the table in order to get a spin at the wheel. What's the alternative? Don't sign Lowry and Ibaka? Start Cory, Demar, Norm, Pascal and JV (or Poeltl)? Tread around the dreaded 7-11 range and return to a basketball wasteland? We lucked into this thing...I wouldn't throw it away just because we may lose to a team that, oh by the way, beat the warriors and won the championship last year. It's always fair to complain and say what you want to get rid of but try and include what you'd have left.

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    • Nilanka wrote: View Post
      I agree with this.

      No amount of "re-tooling" is going to fix this. Our capped our core is fundamentally flawed.
      Again, not to be the sunny eyed optimist, but other than the Warriors and Cleveland (maybe the Spurs), whose core is not fundamentally flawed? Maybe Washington? The grass is not as green everywhere else.

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      • Has the following been discussed before?

        Casey during a practice time presser just before game 2. Quite an admittance imo which in another language could mean...."we do not have the horses to compete with how the best in the league play the game these days".

        The implications are profound. May require a thread of it's own.


        “The league is changing,” said Casey at the Raptors practice Tuesday. “The league is changing. You have to change or you get stuck in the mud. It’s more of a scoring league now. You saw what San Antonio had done to them last night [in a 27-point loss to the Houston Rockets the Spurs gave up 22 threes on 50 attempts].

        “We have to score points,” said Casey, whose club is averaging just 95.4 points a game in the post-season, worst among active teams and 11.4 points off their regular season average. “We have to manufacture points and not get our dobber down if the other team scores. If they score, boom, hey, next play. Not to say defence isn’t important, because it is. But we can’t get caught up in ‘we gotta stop them.’”

        It’s a watershed moment, arguably, with Casey acknowledging that simply planning to win with your defence first can only take you so far. In that context, to put it bluntly, it’s not clear exactly where Valanciunas’s future lies as a starter on an NBA team with championship aspirations, given his limitations offensively and defensively in a wide-open, three-point heavy game.

        http://www.sportsnet.ca/basketball/n...cing-scrutiny/

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        • The 3 point barrage, soft, no defense style of play is turning me off the NBA more and more. Welcome to the AAU generation.

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          • Jclaw wrote: View Post
            Because they may not. Again, regular season caveats aside, this was a 5th (tied) place team in a thirty team league that went through a rough stretch of injuries and played well for half a season with a not yet ready rookie at PF (as opposed to Ibaka). Maybe next year we're the 1st or 2nd seed and we don't face the cavs til the ECF. Or maybe the cavs stumble and get knocked out earlier. Or maybe the clock finally turns on Lebron and the team is nothing. You have to have a seat at the table in order to get a spin at the wheel. What's the alternative? Don't sign Lowry and Ibaka? Start Cory, Demar, Norm, Pascal and JV (or Poeltl)? Tread around the dreaded 7-11 range and return to a basketball wasteland? We lucked into this thing...I wouldn't throw it away just because we may lose to a team that, oh by the way, beat the warriors and won the championship last year. It's always fair to complain and say what you want to get rid of but try and include what you'd have left.
            Agreed. You've gotta remain at the upper echelon of teams in the East for the next few years in hopes of attracting some true top-notch talent. If we go back to scrapping for playoffs or bottoming-out, I will be truly disappointed. I don't anticipate that happening though.

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            • As optimistic as you may be, would you bring back Lowry at a 5 year max contract? Would you sign Ibaka to a 5 year / $100M+ contract? Look at the Clippers, they retained their core and end up doing the same every year. Like I wrote in my other post, it's a matter of what your aspirations are. Be a top 10 team with no real shot at a championship or blow it up with the hopes of landing a generational talent. Nothing wrong with either, but as a Toronto fan; not even just basketball; I want to see a TRUE championship contender.

              Look at what the Maple Leafs did, granted its early to tell but looks like we landed studs in Matthews/Marner/Nylander with a top tier coach and we are already way ahead of schedule on the rebuild. That is the only way to build a champion, with teams like 04 Pistons being anomaly's.

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              • Deems wrote: View Post
                The 3 point barrage, soft, no defense style of play is turning me off the NBA more and more. Welcome to the AAU generation.
                Yeah seriously. They need to move the 3 point line back. Widen the court or something and dont allow corner 3s to be closer.

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                • Bendit wrote: View Post
                  Has the following been discussed before?

                  Casey during a practice time presser just before game 2. Quite an admittance imo which in another language could mean...."we do not have the horses to compete with how the best in the league play the game these days".

                  The implications are profound. May require a thread of it's own.





                  http://www.sportsnet.ca/basketball/n...cing-scrutiny/
                  Is Casey only realizing this now? Or has frustration reached a point that his filter is removed, and wants to finally speak the truth. That an offense built around ISOs, long-twos, and generous whistles, is fool's gold come April.

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                  • Deems wrote: View Post
                    The 3 point barrage, soft, no defense style of play is turning me off the NBA more and more. Welcome to the AAU generation.
                    I was thinking this exact thing watching Houston/Spurs game 1. Makes me feel like an old fart, but honestly if that's what the game turns into they should get rid of the 3 point line.

                    Also, at what point to defences stop helping on drives? Isn't letting Harden go for a one-on-one layup better for the defence than collapsing so he can hit open shooters? That's definitely what the offence wants, why give it to them? When will staying home on shooters be more important than helping on drives?
                    "We're playing in a building." -- Kawhi Leonard

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                    • Deems wrote: View Post
                      As optimistic as you may be, would you bring back Lowry at a 5 year max contract? Would you sign Ibaka to a 5 year / $100M+ contract? Look at the Clippers, they retained their core and end up doing the same every year. Like I wrote in my other post, it's a matter of what your aspirations are. Be a top 10 team with no real shot at a championship or blow it up with the hopes of landing a generational talent. Nothing wrong with either, but as a Toronto fan; not even just basketball; I want to see a TRUE championship contender.

                      Look at what the Maple Leafs did, granted its early to tell but looks like we landed studs in Matthews/Marner/Nylander with a top tier coach and we are already way ahead of schedule on the rebuild. That is the only way to build a champion, with teams like 04 Pistons being anomaly's.
                      On the flip side once you're over the cap there's an argument for retaining talent even if you need to make changes later, let Lowry walk and you can't replace him with a comparable player (assuming maxed out on other re-signings).

                      That said, Lowry wearing down then being so hit or miss from game to game in the postseason is one of the core problems with this team in the spring imho. I did not mind how the team looked with him out and CoJo/Delon at the point post-ASG at all.
                      "We're playing in a building." -- Kawhi Leonard

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                      • I can see the point for tanking I advocated for it but fuck man I wasted my teenage years watching Bosh - Colangelo Raptors. You think making playoffs and not doing well sucks. How about tanking and feeling like there's no future.
                        Only one thing matters: We The Champs.

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                        • MixxAOR wrote: View Post
                          I can see the point for tanking I advocated for it but fuck man I wasted my teenage years watching Bosh - Colangelo Raptors. You think making playoffs and not doing well sucks. How about tanking and feeling like there's no future.
                          But if tanking is done right, wouldn't that lead to a feeling of a prosperous future?

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                          • Machine wrote: View Post
                            Yeah seriously. They need to move the 3 point line back. Widen the court or something and dont allow corner 3s to be closer.
                            Best suggesting I heard was eliminating corner three by extending the line
                            Only one thing matters: We The Champs.

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                            • Nilanka wrote: View Post
                              But if tanking is done right, wouldn't that lead to a feeling of a prosperous future?
                              Tanking is just tanking. It's just having worst record. You still need to get lucky with draft. Draft the right guy. Develop him. Hope he's healthy. And it becomes apparent that doing it once is not enough. You have to do 2 - 3 times. And even that doesn't guarantee the championship.
                              Only one thing matters: We The Champs.

                              Comment


                              • I personally enjoy watching the barrage of 3pt shooting. I appreciate how shooting, a fundamental skill in basketball, is being emphasized again. I hate seeing raw players drafted based on nothing more than "potential", and then getting paid millions to learn how to do basic things like dribble and shoot.

                                But I'm with you guys on the softness of the game. Moving the 3pt line won't change that, however. Just need refs to raise their threshold of what is foul is. But in today's prima donna world of NBA players, this will likely never happen.

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