Why????

[Bonus Jonas]

Thanks for sharing your opinion. You must be psychic.

Who's in the core mr. Psychic? There are only one or two players on this team that I would even consider labelling as part of "the core." All players are up for grabs for the right price. Some obviously have higher values than others.

Some fans are so obsessed with defining "the core." Never mind that the core is usually 1 or 2 players and that can change at any time......Doesn't mean we should tank just because you have a rigid idea of "the core." Players can leave, get injured or just turn out to be overrated. Who knows who Masai considers to be the core? It may be 1 or 2 players or it could be none of them.

So don't scold me with....."this core isn't winning a championship any time soon" bullshit....Who's "the core."? Your core may be different than mine.

As for tanking for great players....

Many great players didn't win championships. Sometimes you run up against Jordan/Olajuwon/Kobe/Duncan/Lebron/Insert next generational talent. It's not as easy as getting a great player. You get a great player and you become a good team. How long will you stay in the draft then? Lebron didn't win one in his first go around in Cleveland and he was there for a long time. Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook are great players and they haven't won one yet. James Harden and Dwight Howard - Chris Paul and Blake Griffin......Will Anthony Davis win one before he leaves NO in free agency?

Nothing's guaranteed or set in stone either. Just because we move forward with a few players from this team doesn't mean we can never win a championship. That's a defeatist attitude.




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Give me a minute to analyze how incorrect this post is and try to put it into words.

[special1]

Give me a minute to analyze how incorrect this post is and try to put it into words.

Minutes up. Oh mighty psychic... Share your all knowing wisdom.




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[Bonus Jonas]

Minutes up. Oh mighty psychic... Share your all knowing wisdom.




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My mistake man, didn't realize this was grade school and people used the literal meaning of minute or second to win an argument. I'm so incredibly sorry I decided to have something to eat and carry on with my life before responding to someone on a forum. How could you guys ever in a million years forgive me?

[Bonus Jonas]

Okay here we go. First of all I only replied to you because you felt you were justified to speak on behalf of "most Raptors fans" and I felt I needed to state that I most definitely don't fit in your grouping and that in my opinion (everything I post is my opinion, it's sad that I even need to state this) there would be plenty of people here who also disagreed with your post and within two posts there was someone that agreed with me (or so it seems), which shows that my post was worth making.

So let's get on with this.

Thanks for sharing your opinion.

You're welcome. And clearly you are aware that what I posted was MY opinion and nothing more.

You must be psychic.

I will address this in this post somewhere else.

Who's in the core mr. Psychic? There are only one or two players on this team that I would even consider labelling as part of "the core." All players are up for grabs for the right price. Some obviously have higher values than others.

Okay, first of all, pick whoever you'd like as your core. Unless there is a huge talent influx in which our core would obviously be changing (as you're adding talent and the new talent is now added to your core), I guarantee you that whatever you chose as your core cannot become a championship team just from adding role players.
(Example: In my opinion the consensus for our core would be Lowry, Demar, JV and possibly PPat. Again, in my opinion, no matter which role players you add to this core, those three (maybe four) players will not be good enough to lead us to a championship. You would have to have someone else come in and add to that core that is more talented.)

Some fans are so obsessed with defining "the core." Never mind that the core is usually 1 or 2 players and that can change at any time......

Exactly, the core can change at any time, but what I stated was that unless it changes, it's not going to win you any championships. Seems like we agree on this.

Doesn't mean we should tank just because you have a rigid idea of "the core."

Never once mentioned anything about tanking.

Players can leave, get injured or just turn out to be overrated.

Again, you saying this points out even further that the core would need to be changed, since if any of these things happen, the core needs more talent influx since talent we were previously counting on, we can no longer count on (whether it is because they left, they got injured or they turned out to be not as good as what we thought they would be.

Who knows who Masai considers to be the core? It may be 1 or 2 players or it could be none of them.

Again, like I already pointed out once, in my opinion, no matter what Masai considers to be the core, it needs more to it.

So don't scold me with....."this core isn't winning a championship any time soon" bullshit....

I'm sorry you think that me sharing my opinion is scolding you. Didn't realize I wasn't allowed to disagree with you, and that if I did you would resort to childish tactics of calling me a "psychic". I'm very perplexed that you feel like you're justified to assume the opinions of "most Raptors fans" and not be considered a psychic but me sharing my opinion means that I am considered a psychic. Let me state that one more time so it's not overlooked, Special1 can speak on behalf of "Most Raptors fans" (his exact words) and assume what their opinions are without even hearing or reading them but if I, Bonus Jonas, share ONE opinion, I'm considered to be a psychic. Wonderful logic.

Who's "the core."? Your core may be different than mine.

Already addressed this, but just in case it didn't register for you yet, no matter what you consider to be your core, you will need a huge talent influx to win a championship. Let me just reiterate that this is my opinion.

As for tanking for great players....

Again, I'm very very confused as to where you saw me state I wanted to tank. It seems to me that you assumed what I was thinking, hmm that must make you a psychic. Thank you so much for your assumption Mr. Psychic.

Many great players didn't win championships. Sometimes you run up against Jordan/Olajuwon/Kobe/Duncan/Lebron/Insert next generational talent. It's not as easy as getting a great player. You get a great player and you become a good team. How long will you stay in the draft then? Lebron didn't win one in his first go around in Cleveland and he was there for a long time. Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook are great players and they haven't won one yet. James Harden and Dwight Howard - Chris Paul and Blake Griffin......Will Anthony Davis win one before he leaves NO in free agency?

I'm aware of this and agree with you. But I would like to think that you would agree when I say that having a Lebron/Durant/Westbrook/Harden/Howard/Paul/Griffin/Davis type player certainly helps you tremendously in your attempt to win a championship. In fact, it seems to be like it's pretty much impossible to win a championship without a player of this calibre, which again I would like to think that you agree when I say that we most definitely do not have. (Unless we become the luckiest fanbase in the history of sports if Bruno becomes that All-NBA, perennial All-Star, high impact player.)

Nothing's guaranteed or set in stone either. Just because we move forward with a few players from this team doesn't mean we can never win a championship.

Again, I never said this. I said you won't win with this core. I think JV is 100% capable of being the starting center of a championship team. If Lowry plays like he did in the beginning of the year, same thing goes for him as a starting PG. Ditto for DeRozan if he can learn to control his shot selection, and play more like the player at the end of this season and less like the one at the beginning. PPat and JJ look to me to be guys that would be perfect off the bench as role players on a championship team.

But with that being said, I'd hope you would agree that you will not win a championship with any of those guys as your best player, maybe even your second best player. This means you need a huge talent influx into the core, thus creating a new core, featuring your new players as the main guys. Unfortunately with the position the Raptors are in, unless Masai is a god and can land a Durant level player in free agency next season, when EVERY team will have boatloads of cap space and players are gonna control their manifest destiny more than they ever have, or that he can somehow get a player of that level in the draft at the #20th overall pick range, or that Bruno (or anyone else on our roster for that matter) will become that player, we absolutely need to part with some of our assets in order to get one of those players. Whether that means trading Lowry, or Demar, or JV, or the knicks pick, or any of those for that matter, you need to do what you can to get superstar level talent on this team.

And if you believe that you don't need a superstar level player to win a title, I'll say it's insanely unlikely to win without one, as I would argue that the Pistons, and maybe last year's Spurs (but you could argue that Pop was their superstar, as his coaching was the reason they won, which yet again, it's just as hard to get a Pop-level coach as it is to get a Durant-level player) were the only team to do that in the last 25 years. In fact, in the last 25 finals, every single one of them has had at least one of Lebron James, Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, Shaquille O'Neal, Michael Jordan or Hakeem Olajuwon. And out of those 24 finals (this one is yet to be determined), one of those 6 players have won 21/24 times with the exceptions being the '08 Celtics (who had a superstar in KG), the '11 Mavericks (who had a superstar in Dirk) and the '04 Pistons, again being the only team to win a title without a superstar in the last 25 years.

That's a defeatist attitude.

I'm not sure how you think I have a defeatist attitude when I'm being realistic in my hopes of witnessing the Raps winning a title one day.

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People still use Tapatalk? I thought it was agreed that the app was terrible and always crashed?



So Special1, feel free to enlighten me with how everything I just posted was wrong and feel free to complain about me scolding you, or resorting to childish tactics to try to justify how you believed you were right, just know literally all I did was share MY OPINION. I clearly wasn't aware I wasn't allowed to do that. Or feel free to ignore this post in a sign of knowing you have just flat out been, as a lot of people say, rekt. Or even better feel free to get frustrated and furious and proceed to block me out of anger. No matter what you do it won't matter, as I'll make sure to not respond to you with MY OPINION ever again, you know, just in case it turns out that I was trying too hard to read you mind and be a psychic.

[Bonus Jonas]

Guys I tried my absolute best at channeling my inner mcHappy, but I keep getting this hunch that I wasn't sarcastic or condescending enough to live up to his shoes lol.

[Frynoodle]

Click here read it from head to toe, then you will get his ideas.

By the way, everyone know how important to get some talents to Raptors, but if you don't have any idea or tell us what steps could 100% or even higher than 50% get LBJ type talent to Raptors, what you had said is totally garbage.

[JoeG15]

But I would like to think that you would agree when I say that having a Lebron/Durant/Westbrook/Harden/Howard/Paul/Griffin/Davis type player certainly helps you tremendously in your attempt to win a championship. In fact, it seems to be like it's pretty much impossible to win a championship without a player of this calibre, which again I would like to think that you agree when I say that we most definitely do not have.

I think we can all agree that this is simply a fact of life in the NBA. So, I am all for the Raps doing whatever they can to get that type of player. The brutal truth is that we're not going to draw any of these types of players in free agency. Sure, it sounds nice to dream of Durant, but that's never going to happen. That leaves the draft as the best possible way for the Raps to get a superstar.

I'm pretty sure that we can all agree that Lowry, DeRozan, and JV are never going to be superstars, so if that means trading one of them, or two, to better the odds of landing a superstar, then so be it. I'm all for it.

I think the main reason that JV is never mentioned in the trade rumors on here is because MU has made in untouchable in the past, so its safe to assume that he's still untouchable, unless MU says otherwise. Adding to that, Lowry and DeRozan are the only two players worth a top ten pick, so they are constantly getting mentioned in the trade rumors.

[Bonus Jonas]

I think we can all agree that this is simply a fact of life in the NBA. So, I am all for the Raps doing whatever they can to get that type of player. The brutal truth is that we're not going to draw any of these types of players in free agency. Sure, it sounds nice to dream of Durant, but that's never going to happen. That leaves the draft as the best possible way for the Raps to get a superstar.

I'm pretty sure that we can all agree that Lowry, DeRozan, and JV are never going to be superstars, so if that means trading one of them, or two, to better the odds of landing a superstar, then so be it. I'm all for it.

I think the main reason that JV is never mentioned in the trade rumors on here is because MU has made in untouchable in the past, so its safe to assume that he's still untouchable, unless MU says otherwise. Adding to that, Lowry and DeRozan are the only two players worth a top ten pick, so they are constantly getting mentioned in the trade rumors.

I agree with all of this

[DogeLover1234]

I think we can all agree that this is simply a fact of life in the NBA. So, I am all for the Raps doing whatever they can to get that type of player. The brutal truth is that we're not going to draw any of these types of players in free agency. Sure, it sounds nice to dream of Durant, but that's never going to happen. That leaves the draft as the best possible way for the Raps to get a superstar.

I'm pretty sure that we can all agree that Lowry, DeRozan, and JV are never going to be superstars, so if that means trading one of them, or two, to better the odds of landing a superstar, then so be it. I'm all for it.

I think the main reason that JV is never mentioned in the trade rumors on here is because MU has made in untouchable in the past, so its safe to assume that he's still untouchable, unless MU says otherwise. Adding to that, Lowry and DeRozan are the only two players worth a top ten pick, so they are constantly getting mentioned in the trade rumors.

Totally agree.

I would only add to the JV bit that he still has a lot of untapped potential, whereas guys like KL and DD are probably at their max trade value right now.

[The Great One]

I think we can all agree that this is simply a fact of life in the NBA. So, I am all for the Raps doing whatever they can to get that type of player. The brutal truth is that we're not going to draw any of these types of players in free agency. Sure, it sounds nice to dream of Durant, but that's never going to happen. That leaves the draft as the best possible way for the Raps to get a superstar.

No they can.

How? build a winning environemnt, build a winning culture.

The Raptors are one of the worst franchise in sports, long history of losing. 20 years of futility. When Americans or non-Raps fans think of the Raptors they think of Canada(obviously) and snow and Vince Carter. That's just how it is. And that needs to change.

How do you do that? you win. You build a winning culture. Like i said before, forget about championships, with this franchise they need to build a winning environment FIRST. I think its very crucial. You do that, free agents will come, your luck will turn around, then you can start talking championships.

The Raps actually are in a great spot right now. They have a lot of momentum right now with the back to back division title, 48 and 49 win season and the "We The North" crap. All star game next year. If they decide to all of a sudden blow this thing up(which i don't think will happen) and tank or rebuild. Oh boy......

[OldSkoolCool]

No they can.

How? build a winning environemnt, build a winning culture.

The Raptors are one of the worst franchise in sports, long history of losing. 20 years of futility. When Americans or non-Raps fans think of the Raptors they think of Canada(obviously) and snow and Vince Carter. That's just how it is. And that needs to change.

How do you do that? you win. You build a winning culture. Like i said before, forget about championships, with this franchise they need to build a winning environment FIRST. I think its very crucial. You do that, free agents will come, your luck will turn around, then you can start talking championships.

The Raps actually are in a great spot right now. They have a lot of momentum right now with the back to back division title, 48 and 49 win season and the "We The North" crap. All star game next year. If they decide to all of a sudden blow this thing up(which i don't think will happen) and tank or rebuild. Oh boy......

Playing < .500 ball in 2015 and getting swept in the first place is not what I would call "in a good place" or "building a winning environment or culture"

[consmap]

I don't know how sustainable this success is. If DeMar demands a lot of DeDough in the future it'll make it hard to sign free agents. Also, I dunno if "winning culture" can be used to describe a team that can barely get past the first round. Sustainable success should be what the franchise strives for, and personally I think the draft is the way to go.

Also we don't have Tom Sterner so there's no point in anything anymore so we might as well start over

[special1]

Why????

Speak for yourself. This core isn't having any chance at a championship any time soon

Okay, first of all, pick whoever you'd like as your core. Unless there is a huge talent influx in which our core would obviously be changing (as you're adding talent and the new talent is now added to your core), I guarantee you that whatever you chose as your core cannot become a championship team just from adding role players.
(Example: In my opinion the consensus for our core would be Lowry, Demar, JV and possibly PPat. Again, in my opinion, no matter which role players you add to this core, those three (maybe four) players will not be good enough to lead us to a championship. You would have to have someone else come in and add to that core that is more talented.)



Exactly, the core can change at any time, but what I stated was that unless it changes, it's not going to win you any championships.

I said you won't win with this core. I think JV is 100% capable of being the starting center of a championship team. If Lowry plays like he did in the beginning of the year, same thing goes for him as a starting PG. Ditto for DeRozan if he can learn to control his shot selection, and play more like the player at the end of this season and less like the one at the beginning. PPat and JJ look to me to be guys that would be perfect off the bench as role players on a championship team.

But with that being said, I'd hope you would agree that you will not win a championship with any of those guys as your best player, maybe even your second best player. This means you need a huge talent influx into the core, thus creating a new core, featuring your new players as the main guys. Unfortunately with the position the Raptors are in, unless Masai is a god and can land a Durant level player in free agency next season, when EVERY team will have boatloads of cap space and players are gonna control their manifest destiny more than they ever have, or that he can somehow get a player of that level in the draft at the #20th overall pick range, or that Bruno (or anyone else on our roster for that matter) will become that player, we absolutely need to part with some of our assets in order to get one of those players. Whether that means trading Lowry, or Demar, or JV, or the knicks pick, or any of those for that matter, you need to do what you can to get superstar level talent on this team.

Guys I tried my absolute best at channeling my inner mcHappy, but I keep getting this hunch that I wasn't sarcastic or condescending enough to live up to his shoes lol.

It seems that we agree on some things.
I only see DD and JV as part of the core moving forward (my opinion). Although, I wouldn't mind adding PPat to the core.

Its interesting that you concede that Lowry, Ppat, Demar and JV can be part of a championship team. You acknowledge that you think they're the core of this team. This contradicts your post where you said we can't win one with this core (your core).

I've always stated that we should surround our core player(s) with better talent. People disagree on how we can get better talent. I apologize for assuming that you were one of the many fans advocating tanking. I would need to go through the threads for proof of it. Maybe you can clarify your stance in your response.

My point was that we do have some good pieces. You assumed my core was your core and that's probably where you went wrong. We do need to add better players....(isn't that obvious)??

We can get some good pieces for Lowry. Teams such as Houston, New York and Sacramento may be interested. We can also get a good player in free agency. Without knowing who's coming back and who we can add, how can you make the statement that you made? Why did you assume that we would not add better players?

We lack a starting PF and a starting SF. We lack a coach with a proper offensive system. The defensive system has been a disaster for this team as well (although we don't have much in terms of great defensive players - Maybe JJ and a healthy Amir?).

Is it fair to judge "the core" knowing this??

I appreciate your response, but you contradicted yourself when you listed the players (in your perceived core) from this team that you can see on a championship team. If your point was - if we kept the exact same players in your core and did not improve the talent, we we'll never win a championship....I'd agree with you.

I absolutely believe that we can add talent (without tanking) to the few players we have in "the core." It takes a shrewd GM to make this happen. It's not gonna happen right away, but it can be done gradually.

I guess I forgot to put (in my opinion) after the statement where I said "Most Raptors fans want to watch a competitive TEAM (not the core or your core) grow and IMPROVE until we have the chance at a championship in the near future. You see? You made the assumption I was talking about "the core" or your core. That's where you went wrong.

Also, your post was the nice, non-sarcastic, non-condescending version of McHappy.









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[Bonus Jonas]

Seeing as you're being hostile I'll respond, but you misread my post.

1. I said the consensus would probably be Lowry, DD, JV and maybe PPat. That's not my core.
2. Yes you can win with the guys I mentioned but I clearly stated you need superstar talent and you won't get it without dealing some of these guys.
3. Also, just because you can win with them on the team, doesn't mean you can win with them as the core, which you can't. Again, you need a superstar which means it's bo longer the same core.
4. I said multiple times it doesn't matter what your core is. So not sure how you think I assumed your core.
5. I assumed we wouldn't add better players because then it's a different core which contradicts my original post, which is that you can win with our current core being our core.

6. Finally, I said core because your train of thought is to keep dd, JV and pp and trade lowry, and address the missing pieces through free agency I'm guessing? I'm saying that's not gonna get us a superstar and we still won't be a championship team.

[Axel]

Guys I tried my absolute best at channeling my inner mcHappy, but I keep getting this hunch that I wasn't sarcastic or condescending enough to live up to his shoes lol.

Solid post nonetheless.