Rebuild or Re-tool? (thread merge in post #358)

[mcHAPPY]

Despite all the hoopla of the presser and media day, I still think the end result is a blow up of the roster and a crazy aggressive rebuild that ends is a marquee free agent.....

***yeah, yeah, likely more hope talking than reality***

.... I find it strange that:

• Leiweke cans Colangelo because they disagree on the state of the roster and direction of the franchise
• Ujiri is brought in who shares vision with Leiweke
• Drake is brought in who shares vision with Masai and Tim

.... yet status-quo is on the agenda?

On his fandomMy favourite memories all stem from the Vince Carter era. It was an amazing feeling to have a player of that magnitude here, a star. I remember the first time I ever saw him featured in a music video. I want to bring exciting players here. I want to give them those memories.http://sports.nationalpost.com/2013/...e-cheap-seats/

JV is going to be a great basketball player but I don't think he is ever going to be an exciting star outside of Lithuania.

For the Raptors to get those exciting star players there are only two options:
1) draft,
2) free agency.

In today's NBA, you don't get the star free agents without other stars or a really good supporting cast along with cap space. As the roster currently stands there are no other stars and there is no cap space.

We'll see how it plays out but with a franchise C already on the roster, a total rebuild in 2 years is possible in my opinion assuming the team guts the dead weight sooner than later.

[mcHAPPY]

Paul Jones, Sportsnet: Raps, Celtics shouldn't tank for Wiggins

If you hold up all eight fingers and one thumb, you have the exact number of teams that have won the title since 1980.

But what is the best way to build? Acquire the draft picks, develop them and try to create a culture of winning. Realize that some of those picks might be traded along the way to make the team stronger, and that if you are fortunate enough to have some success, regardless of where you are on the map, that winning may help you attract a few key free agents and change the perception of your franchise league-wide.

http://www.sportsnet.ca/basketball/n...ndrew-wiggins/

[mcHAPPY]

What I would send back to Paul Jones:

As for Raptors fans clamouring for the tank to roll through Toronto: forget it. It may be the consolation prize in February if the team is doing poorly. But Raptors general manager Masai Ujiri is on the record saying, “we’re not going to give players away and I’m not sure how you teach winning by losing.”

I'm not sure what that quote from Masai is suppose to mean. If anything Jones has taken an interpretation of the words. Here is another interpretation: the Raptors can still trade players away and receive valuable assets in return and, as Ujiri trading Melo showed in Denver, a team can be better after trading away its best player.

The Raptors will play to win. And why not? Toronto is eyeing its longest playoff drought—at five seasons and counting. Playing for ping pong balls means a sixth-straight campaign without the post-season, and then you’re likely looking at another couple of seasons before the next chance at the playoffs. This isn’t Boston or Philadelphia, both of the Celtics and Sixers have played on Mother’s Day in recent seasons.

Toronto has been playing for the playoffs for 3 of those 5 seasons. 2010/11 and 2011/12 were the only two years Toronto never made a legit attempt to compete. In those two years they acquired JV in the draft and they could have had another franchise talent in Drummond. Unfortunately the goal became saving the previous regimes job and bloated contract after bloated contract was handed out and the rush to accelerate began. Jones is right, this isn't Boston or Philly. Those teams have been in recent memory where Toronto is struggling to achieve: the playoffs. They built playoff teams (and championship team in Boston case) the right way and they are rebuilding the right way. Drafting is only part of the equation: accumulating assets and financial flexibility are the others.

You can tank all you want, get high picks for consecutive seasons and still never secure a transcendent player. For the teams that choose to tank, their losing may start a downward spiral before an honest effort starts to supply some positive results. In the immortal words of former New York Jets head coach Herman Edwards,”you play to win the game.”

B*ullshit. Coaches and players play to win games. Management don't play the games though. Players and coaches go game to game. Management look at season to season. Good management will transform assets in to success - no matter which way they chose to build as the examples in Jones' article showed. The issue in Toronto is the overall talent is missing, there are no expendable valuable assets with the current core, and there is no financial flexibility to take in a lopsided trade. Anyone remember what New Jersey/Brooklyn looked like on the last game of the 2011-12 season? Where are they now?


**Thank goodness the games are almost here!**

[Nilanka]

I can never tell if Smith and Jones are actually speaking their minds, or if they're just spewing corporate messages.

With Colangelo gone, I would assume the muzzles no longer exist, but then again, you just never know...

[mcHAPPY]

I can never tell if Smith and Jones are actually speaking their minds, or if they're just spewing corporate messages.

With Colangelo gone, I would assume the muzzles no longer exist, but then again, you just never know...

lol - agreed

I hope this is the message MU/TL want out there so Toronto can enter any trade discussion from a position of strength. If they wait too long and the losses pile up or are sitting outside the playoffs, there will be no strength to be had regardless.

[Superjudge]

Honestly, anyone living in Toronto, and understanding the NBA climate that exists here not on the "Wiggans or Bust" wagon needs to have their heads read. Toronto, morse this than ANY year, needs to be last place. If there is a potential Superstar in the making, from Toronto, in next years draft, this franchise must do ANYTHING, unfair, immoral, illegal, or otherwise to gain the best possible position from which to select him.

Its that simple.

[Shantz]

The Raptors hosted their first ever Season Preview event for season ticket holders. TSN has a good article which sums up the night, including some good quotes about the direction of the team moving forward:

""For me there's no spin to it, I don't believe in all that, for me everything is from here," he said pointing to his heart. "You say what your plan is, you say what your direction is and you go execute. We have to be accountable and that's what [fans] want, that's what I think we are supposed to do."


""We have to figure out our team and evaluate everything and that evaluation starts October 30," Ujiri explained. "Is there chemistry? Is there growth? Are we moving in the right direction? Are players getting better? Are we giving them the right opportunity?"

http://m.tsn.ca/nba/article?url=http...A&feedId=82003

Although this is nothing brand new, and is filled with buzzwords (chemistry, growth, etc.), I can't help but read into this how unattached to this roster he truly is.

[Bendit]

I have said this before and shall do so once more...TL did not come here to play around with the status quo. He bounced BC because he got advice from pros in the business that the team was mired and overpaid. He hires MU and they both sing kumbaya/from the same hymn book that they are on the same wave length.

Now unless the basketball gods wave a wand and turn the mice into stallions, logic dictates that MU is lying in the weeds to achieve a high draft pick (whether ours or by trade) in what promises to be they say the best collection of talent in a decade. More cap space (eg. by trading Gay) to get at least 1 quality f/a and 2 top six first rounders next summer will suit me just fine. I am personally not stuck on Wiggins specifically. That's a fools errand imo. Let then the games begin.

ps getting another high first thru trade will admittedly be difficult but....

[white men can't jump]

I have said this before and shall do so once more...TL did not come here to play around with the status quo. He bounced BC because he got advice from pros in the business that the team was mired and overpaid. He hires MU and they both sing kumbaya/from the same hymn book that they are on the same wave length.

Now unless the basketball gods wave a wand and turn the mice into stallions, logic dictates that MU is lying in the weeds to achieve a high draft pick (whether ours or by trade) in what promises to be they say the best collection of talent in a decade. More cap space (eg. by trading Gay) to get at least 1 quality f/a and 2 top six first rounders next summer will suit me just fine. I am personally not stuck on Wiggins specifically. That's a fools errand imo. Let then the games begin.

ps getting another high first thru trade will admittedly be difficult but....

I don't know why people are so obsessed with getting a high first in a trade....Not suggesting your obsessed, specifically, but given the talent in this draft, it also wouldn't be bad to pick up a later pick, especially if Ujiri wants scouting to be improved during his tenure.

If the Raps land a top 6 or 7 pick of their own by deciding to blow it up, I'd be ok with another acquired pick being in the late teens or early 20s...especially since it's so incredibly early at this point that we definitely don't know who could slide even just a few spots. And those picks are probably more likely to be available.

I'm a firm believer that no team that figures to be in the lottery will trade away their pick. The best chance would be conning a fringe playoff team into an early season trade and hoping they totally disintegrate....but even then, would any team part with a pick that wasn't highly protected?

If people really want to rebuild through the draft, they have to realize there is talent lower in the draft, and that there will be talent in subsequent drafts that might even be much easier to trade into the top of, especially right now if teams will value them less than a pick in this year's draft.

[mcHAPPY]

I have said this before and shall do so once more...TL did not come here to play around with the status quo. He bounced BC because he got advice from pros in the business that the team was mired and overpaid. He hires MU and they both sing kumbaya/from the same hymn book that they are on the same wave length.

Now unless the basketball gods wave a wand and turn the mice into stallions, logic dictates that MU is lying in the weeds to achieve a high draft pick (whether ours or by trade) in what promises to be they say the best collection of talent in a decade. More cap space (eg. by trading Gay) to get at least 1 quality f/a and 2 top six first rounders next summer will suit me just fine. I am personally not stuck on Wiggins specifically. That's a fools errand imo. Let then the games begin.

ps getting another high first thru trade will admittedly be difficult but....

Exactly. Games have yet to be played - guys will fall, guys will come from out of nowhere but:

Randle, Exum, Harrison, Smart, Selden, Gordon, Parker, in addition to Wiggins. If the Raptors can get in the top 8 in this draft I feel pretty confident that would be equal to a top 2 pick last year.

[mcHAPPY]

I don't know why people are so obsessed with getting a high first in a trade....Not suggesting your obsessed, specifically, but given the talent in this draft, it also wouldn't be bad to pick up a later pick, especially if Ujiri wants scouting to be improved during his tenure.

If the Raps land a top 6 or 7 pick of their own by deciding to blow it up, I'd be ok with another acquired pick being in the late teens or early 20s...especially since it's so incredibly early at this point that we definitely don't know who could slide even just a few spots. And those picks are probably more likely to be available.

I'm a firm believer that no team that figures to be in the lottery will trade away their pick. The best chance would be conning a fringe playoff team into an early season trade and hoping they totally disintegrate....but even then, would any team part with a pick that wasn't highly protected?

If people really want to rebuild through the draft, they have to realize there is talent lower in the draft, and that there will be talent in subsequent drafts that might even be much easier to trade into the top of, especially right now if teams will value them less than a pick in this year's draft.

Charlotte with Detroits and Portland's pick is my wet dream.

I agree with you on later picks too. Weltman and Masai have shown very good drafting abilities and draft night trading in the last few years with mid to late first round picks.

[white men can't jump]

Charlotte with Detroits and Portland's pick is my wet dream.

I agree with you on later picks too. Weltman and Masai have shown very good drafting abilities and draft night trading in the last few years with mid to late first round picks.

Especially with this draft that is supposedly stacked. Some of the mid-late first rounders could be comparable to top 10 talents in most years. And I can believe it with this draft. And I think you've even mentioned before, it looks like a good PG crop, even after the top guys like Smart and Harrison, and Exum depending on whether you think he'll actually be slotted at PG in the NBA. Semaj Christon looks plenty intriguing for example. I want a PG to slot next to Jonas so badly....one that can actually play with a big man.

[Axel]

To paraphrase the great philosopher of our time, LL Cool J:

"Don't call it a re-build, we've been building for years"

[Superjudge]

Ha!

[mcHAPPY]

*BUMP to the original TANK thread*

Another Toronto reporter looking for a tank.

Kelly earlier today and now Bruce Arthur:

This is why you tank. This is why you trade good players with bad contracts, why you start a point guard who can’t dribble or a big man with heavy feet, why your bench is a rec league. This is why you stare glumly at the scoreboard, why some nights are long and empty, why your coach needs a drink. Sports are supposed to be about winning and, in the NBA, that means sometimes you have to lose.

Tuesday night ESPN put together four of the best college basketball teams in the country, and 80 NBA scouts showed up, and the lights turned on. The NBA is about finding superstars, and when superstars don’t force their way to your town — LeBron James, Chris Paul, and so forth — the draft is the best place to unearth them. Not every draft is created equal, but the best ones change franchises. Some years, the stars come in a constellation.

There is a thrill to this, the giddy unknown, the lightness of possibility. What could they be? What will they become? You don’t know what’s inside them, how they will handle the attention and their talent and the future, but this looks like the kind of draft class where you don’t just have to luck into the top pick to change your franchise. The last time a raft of teams tried to lose to get stars, it was for the 2003 draft, where James, Carmelo Anthony, Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade all went in the top five. It ended badly, but it beat the alternative.

And that is why even though Raptors general manager Masai Ujiri is loathe to lose on purpose, hates the way it can poison a culture and hurt your reputation, and has promised patience and long-range thinking, it is time to tank. You can argue that letting Rudy Gay become the first player since at least 1985 to take 37 shots and not score 30 points is like tanking, or that DeMar DeRozan and Gay’s combined low-efficiency mess is tanking, or that coach Dwane Casey’s strange rotation and in-game coaching is tanking.

But Gay and DeRozan aren’t this bad, and Kyle Lowry will get healthier, and this team will plod around the soggy middle. Yes, it would be very difficult to move Gay and get real value back. Yes, DeRozan and Lowry are in sell-low mode. Yes, Utah’s already out ahead, and Sacramento’s a mess, but Philadelphia and Phoenix and Boston have accidentally won some games, although it might not last. Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski pretended to have never heard of tanking after Tuesday’s game, saying, “If that is happening, shame on whoever is doing it.”

No. Because the world is based on incentives and probabilities, and sometimes you have to work lousy jobs, or play lousy players, to get where you need to go. It won’t be easy, but tank. Blow it up. Fall apart as hard as you can, and reach for the stars.

http://sports.nationalpost.com/2013/...medium=twitter