Review Of The Raptors First 36 Games

[Built Ford Tough]

Best Offensive Weapon: Chris Bosh

Best Defensive Weapon:Jarrett Jack

Biggest Disappointment: Jose Calderon

Biggest Surprise: Jarrett Jack

 

Grade: B

 

Read the entire article here:

 

http://www.hoopsworld.com/Story.asp?story_id=14901

 

Jarrett Jack is definitely not the biggest surprise of the season for the team, that would have to be Amir Johnson. Jack was given the majority of the MLE, and when you give a player the MLE obviously you are expecting him to be a fairly significant contributor to the team, and I know that Jack was expected to have a fairly substantial role this season.

 

On the other hand, Johnson was expected to be a bench warmer for the Raptors this season and only see minutes in garbage time, but instead, he has been the best Raptor off of the bench all season long for the Raptors, and arguably their best defensive player as well, which leads me to my next complaint about this article.

 

Jarrett Jack has not been the best defensive player for the Raptors this season either. His defense has been mediocore at best all season long, and it only looks somewhat decent because he replaced Calderon, who is arguably the worst defensive player in the league. Just because the Raptors have played better defense over the last little while doesn't mean that Jack was the cause of it. The Raptors entire team as a whole have played improved defense over the last little while.

 

Amir Johnson has been the Raptors best defensive player so far this season, but even if you want to give it to a player who has a more promminent role on the team, Bosh deserves it more than Jack does.

 

I agree with the other two catagories, but those are basically a given.

[Check my Stats]

I definitely think we need a better wing, specifically a starting SG. Right now I think our wing rotation is one of the weakest parts of our team, Belli is so inconsistent and Wright and Weems seem to forget what they are in the game for at times and try to be catalysts offensively. Someone like Battier (just an example) is a guy we need on the wing, whether we are able to obtain one is something I don't know.

 

I completely agree with the Amir Johnson thing you said, he is definitely the most surprising. He typically plays well within himself (more than can be said for the majority of our bench) and does what he does best which is hustle and rebound. He has gotten better at not taking dumb fouls, he has been a really solid contributor in the absence of Reggie all year (still can't believe it takes half a season to recover from a sprained foot).

 

But like I said, as much as I am in favour of developing Demar and getting him minutes, we need a guy who can start and end games for us instead of this two PG backcourt. Demar could arguably be the worst starting 2 in the entire NBA... I think we could get him his 15 minutes Triano gives him, coming off the bench. Wright shouldn't get any time and Weems and Marco could get garbage minutes. BC should be hunting for a SG, someone like Salmons would be nice I think....

[BasX]

I could even give surprise to Sonny Weems because he was barely thought to make the roster and he has had a large impact off the bench. Offensive player is a given, disappointment is a given as well. Defensive is Amir without a doubt, kid hustles and is 35th in Rebound Rate just below Lamar Odom and above people such as Tyson Chandler, Chris Andersen and Marc Gasol.

[Built Ford Tough]

I completely agree with the Amir Johnson thing you said, he is definitely the most surprising. He typically plays well within himself (more than can be said for the majority of our bench) and does what he does best which is hustle and rebound. He has gotten better at not taking dumb fouls, he has been a really solid contributor in the absence of Reggie all year (still can't believe it takes half a season to recover from a sprained foot).

 

He doesn't have a sprained foot, like they originally diagnosed. It turns out that he actually tore the Lisfranc ligament in his foot, which is the space between the bones of the forefoot and the midfoot and keeps all of bones in the foot in the proper place (or something along those lines).

 

Here is a diagram of it that I found posted on another message board:

 

http://xnet.kp.org/permanentejournal/winter09/winter09images/footFig3Big.jpg

 

This is the reason why it is taking so long, because the injury is more severe than they originally diagnosed. I remember hearing about it on Raptors TV a couple of days ago and I also read about it on another message board.

[Erick Blasco]

Out of nowhere, Toronto's really picked up their defense the last handful of games and are playing very good ball. Does anyone have any theories why?

[BasX]

No real change to the rotation but Bargnani's post D has been great in the last few games. That isn't the only reason but it has to be a large reason.

[Built Ford Tough]

Out of nowhere, Toronto's really picked up their defense the last handful of games and are playing very good ball. Does anyone have any theories why?

 

I think a lot of it has to do with the team getting more accustomed to playing with each other. The team underwent a complete overhaul in the summer and only had 3 players returning from last season (well, 3 people who actually play a role on the team other than cheerleader) and there was bound to be some chemistry issues, especially with the fact that the Raptors played their first 30 games in like 53 days or something, leaving little time for practice.

 

They didn't communicate very well defensively from what I could see (hard to get a real accurate judgement watching games on TV though) and the team didn't really know what to expect from each other. After playing together for a while they seem to finally get each others tendancies on the defensive end of the floor which is making their help defense better.

 

Confidence is probably the most substantial reason though. The Raptors have went on a nice streak as of late and you can see them playing with more intensity and passion defensively. They are getting wins which is making everybody give more of an effort to do the little things on defense that are required to win games. With them winning games they seem to be more confident in each other and are playing with more passion as a result.

 

Obviously the stretch of games where they played weaker teams has helped boost their defensive stats as well, but considering these same weaker teams have torched the Raptors earlier in the season, any improvement is more than welcome.

[Check my Stats]

I feel like they actually care now. Before watching it felt like no one really gave a [expletive] besides Bosh, but now guys actually get mad when there is a defensive break down. Bargnani has been playing well, I feel like as Bargnani goes we go, he is definitely the x-factor for this team because he needs to be able to score as our second option offensively on a consistent basis.

 

Also good looks on that Reggie thing, I wanted Reggie in the lineup just to see the intensity he could instill in our players and hopefully make us a harder working team. But Amir has stepped in nicely for us.