Arena The NBA Thread

pretty crazy move. guess the raps are hoping they can win kawhi over with a red carpet treatment like pg in okc. i could see it working too, but kawhi's motivations are just so mysterious. nba has to be happy to see some power shifting back to the east. it's a downgrade for the spurs, but getting an all-star still in his prime and signed for three years is probably the best they could hope for. going to be weird to see the spurs without parker, kawhi and green.

 

Did the Raps have another option, though? You look forward and Boston and Philly are going to be hard to top, especially once they fully gel. The combo you've been running out there probably isn't good enough to beat those two in the playoffs. so you roll the dice and see if you can make one run. If it works and you get to the Finals, that's mission accomplished, even if you get swept and Leonard leaves. And if you lose in the Conference Finals or Semis and then Leonard bolts ... you at least swung for the fences, right?

 

There's multiple aspects to this from the Raptors perspective.

1) In order to retain Kyle Lowry originally they had to sign him and Serge Ibaka (Same agent and he was pitching both as a tandem) to 3-year deals. The Raptors compete window was basically 2 years.

2) I love Derozan as a Raptors fan just as a solid likeable dude and he's an all star in the regular season but come playoff team he has consistently caved under pressure and performed well below his regular season numbers. Kawhi Leonard is the exact opposite. He's a Finals MVP winner.

3) I think they're hoping to pull a Paul George move where they hope him spending a year and being in a new situation and making friends and winning games and enjoying the New York-lite city life Toronto has on offer for partying and food and entertainment (along with the 50 million extra dollars they can now offer him over any other team next year) gives them an advantage. You have to remember that being the NBA's only non-US city has consistently made it hard for Toronto to attract US-born superstars. Our best shot is showing them what it's like and hoping they stay. It's the only time it's really worked for us before. Opportunities to have any kind of sit down and tiny advantage to potentially sway top 8 NBA players (and Kawhi is exactly that when you look at his real plus minus stats and consider his elite defence) is a gamble we need to take. It's the same thing OKC did in a way. OKC is not seen as a great fun place to live but they have Westbrook and they hoped Paul George would come and like it enough and want to stay and take the extra money and not go to LA. Raptors are obviously willing to gamble to have the shot to at least make that pitch with that extra money on the table when they do. Chances to add top 10 players are rare for markets that aren't viewed the same way as the LA's, Boston's Miamis, etc of the league.

4) If he still goes to LA (and he likely will) then the Raptors accelerated their rebuild. They trade Lowry and rebuild and go into the lottery with the new lottery odds and start over. It just happens a year earlier with less assets to trade to help it.

5) Lebron James left the conference and the Raptors are kind of peaked otherwise. If they're going to try and have their best season and postseason ever this is it. Even making it to an NBA Finals would be seen as a fun ride and a new milestone for a franchise like theirs.

6) Makes next year just more interesting to watch. We'd seen the Lowry and Derozan show a lot and knew what it looked like but this is new. Pro sports are almost like TV shows in a way. This adds more intrigue to the season of TV.

7) If somehow it all falls apart they still have the ability to trade him again at the deadline to LA for maybe some assets. Especially if Lebron is impatient and doesn't want to blow a competitive playoff year of his prime and forces the issue a little more and there's motivation.

@heels1785 , Nick Nurse was the biggest reason Coach Casey won COTY. As a diehard Raptors fan it was Nurse's offensive system that was the big change. Masai Ujiri asked for a revamped offence and got it. That was all Nurse. I like Casey but the Raptors won 59 games by changing their offence and that was Nurse.

 

I get why Raptors throws the dice on this. I don't get why Spurs want DeRozan though. the dude couldn't handle it in the eastern playoffs, he will never make it in the west.

 

Also at play in any Raptors pitch for Kawhi to stay is that apparently they lied to DeRozan's face about not trading him.

Mostly linking that b/c the video is RJ lol

 

He does have a quality coach in Pop.

 

i thought of this joke like three days late @epic, okay here goes:

20 million?!?! not exactly a jabargain.

 

Twitter's on point today.

 

My feeling is that its a loss for both teams.

DeRozan is clearly a downgrade.

Kawhi is almost certainly leaving after one season. If Toronto was going to start the rebuild soon enough anyway, if I were them I would have gotten more for DeRozan than just Kawhi for one season. I would have preferred long term assets.

 

Don't know how CA gets the Rockets closer to a title but I guess it cannot work. And meanwhile the Bulls newest FA Jabari Parker admits he doesn't play defense:

http://www.espn.com/nba/story/_/id/...parker-says-better-offense-wins-championships

I guess you give him props for honesty!?!?!?!

 

Been out all day with the family on vacation. I think Schroeder for Melo is a nice surprise. Wasn't expecting to get anything.

 

According to Demarcus Cousins:

"Draymond probably had the worst pitch," he said while chuckling. "He was like, 'Cous, I'm pretty sure me and you are going to fight.'

 

Best NBA story of the off-season

 

Rumor is Love extension, 4 yr $120m

If so I'm pumped. Here's a dude who weathered all the locker room rumors despite knowing a lot of the drama was Kyrie, who took jokes about "fitting in" with a smile and an openness about his own mental health, who answered questions about his effectiveness against the Warriors by hounding the unanimous MVP into a crucial miss in the final seconds of one of the greatest Game 7's of all time, who celebrated Cleveland's first championship with the Smoking Skull belt and a Stone Cold beer bath.

Or here are my feelings in fewer words

 

I'm pumped to have Kevin Love back. I would have been happy if he wanted to be traded and Cleveland did a full-on reboot and rebuild, but if Kevin wants to be in Cleveland, HELL YES we want him. Hopefully he retires in Cleveland, get's a statue that's an inch taller than LeBron's, and then becomes a minority owner when Dan sells the team to LeBron


And in other news, It's possible J R Smith just realized LeBron is leaving Cleveland.

 

He's Staying!

#AllYouNeedIsLove

 

With the Curse of Lebron finally lifted from the East, the Raps needed to make a Big Time Move and the same crew in the playoffs again with no change probably wouldn't have done them any good. miss DeRozan already, though, poor fella. Hopefully this Leonard guy stays healthy / shows up / actually plays! Cuz I wanna see them make it to the Big Show. And win it fer crissakes! I'm totally fine with a one year rental if it pays off.

 

Vince Carter's signed with the Hawks

 

Bring him back to T.O. too!

 

This man is a marketing genius: