Grantland's Annual NBA League Pass Rankings

[planetmars]

Lowe and Simmons out in Grantland put together a ranking of each team using the following rating system:

Category No. 1: Relevance/Zeitgeist
Category No. 2: Hoops Nerdgasm Potential
Category No. 3: League Pass Minutiae
Category No. 4: Individual Player Appeal
Category No. 5: Unintentional Comedy/Irrational Affection/Personality Intangibles

It is quite entertaining.. they did it in two parts:

Part One: http://grantland.com/the-triangle/th...nkings-part-1/
Part Two: http://grantland.com/the-triangle/th...nkings-part-2/

The Raptors ranked 11th (and are mentioned in part 2):

Toronto Raptors

Simmons: Infinitely more fun on the Trade Machine than League Pass. Do you realize they have $28 million worth of Johnson/Fields/Hayes/Williams/Hansbrough expirings? My God. I need to take a long shower and regroup.

Lowe: Hold on, hold on. Amir Johnson is really good! Lou Williams is the king of the 2-for-1, non–Chris Paul division. Tyler Hansbrough might be a psychopath! Their GM dropped the F-bomb at a public rally!

Simmons: Good work, I’m back in on T-Dot. You needed only 35 words to sway me.

Lowe: These guys are fun! They carry over almost the entirety of a team that was really good. Lowry-DeRozan is a legit top-five NBA backcourt, and I’m pumped for Year 3 of Jonas Valanciunas. He has issues defensively around the rim and he’ll pump-fake himself into the ground on offense, but the guy can flat score on the block. Get onboard, unless you hate Canada.

Simmons: How dare you. I love Canada, I love Canada Dry, I love the Canadian national anthem, I love Canadians, I love Lorne Michaels, I love Steve Nash, I love hockey … (this could go on for 1,750 more words, so I’ll stop).

[S.R.]

That's as high as I'd expect anybody outside of the market to put them. Lowe has a soft spot for the Raps, and Simmons fears the wrath of Raptors Truthers. I think Jalen Rose has also swayed him to thinking of T-Dot as a great city.

[Shirokin]

I've never read it, but I find it unbelievable Bill Simmons wrote a book called the Book of Basketball. He's almost like a figure head of people who watch basketball religiously but understand little about it. He is mildly entertaining though and Grantland has some great content and writers, mostly.

Another problem is that league pass isn't very good (at least from my free trial use haha).