Quote:
Originally Posted by St. Pats
If Ibaka is one of your best players you are in big trouble. He is like a shadow of his former self. Now in his late 30's or whatever age he is there is precious little left. Lowry ain't getting any younger either. ISO Derozan would be fine if he would play the way he did during the regular season (less minutes, less shots,more three pointers etc.)
But that is all beside the point. Yes very much if I was GM I would have done exactly what the current GM tried to do. Which was evaluate his roster and tank. He dumped Gay and got back some fodder. He had the deal in place to jettison Lowry and then Dolan changed the whole plan. So funny but so Raptors like that an owner steps out of the blue and kiboshes a done deal. The tank was in place and they could have battled it out with the 76er's for best young team.
The fodder worked during regular season play till it was obvious they were indeed rubbish. So they went for a younger bench who once again propped up the weak starting five. Yet more regular season success. Unfortunately in the playoffs your starters can play a lot and have ample rest between games and limited travel. The stars become so very important and Raptors have two of the worst playoff performers of all time(look up their playoff shooting percentages / amazingly bad) Ibaka not worth mentioning as he isn't even a factor.
So yeah the only hope was to keep just firing shots from whoever was open which worked all season. Can they actually play that way in the playoffs? IF not they are done cause they don't have the stars to compete.
Ujiri tried to do it right. Got done in by Dolan. That the sum of the parts did better than was reasonable to be believed forced the all in moves last year. They got owned as expected. So close to a proper rebuild. So close.
Never-the-less the East is so weak that any of the teams could win it. Including the Raptors if they just go back to team ball cause they have only wannabe stars.
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No one should ever strive to be like 76ers. They turned the team into a joke and the league was forced to step in.
If that is the only way to build a winner going forward the league is doomed . (Not saying it might not be )
Plus what if you don’t win he lottery? They weren’t close to a proper rebuild. They had not even started. They would need to tank for 3-4 years and hope to win the lottery, in a year with a star”s”
Honestly , even if you include the West, how many teams do you think are better then the Raptors
And next year will be ther final shot, and if they fail they will deal Lowry and Ibakas expiring deals and do the rebuild. They set up the team this way to have 2 more shots at it