Fan Duel Toronto Raptors

Morning Coffee – June 5

Canoe Some think Bosh isn’t worth a max deal anyways, so the Raptors should just get whatever they can for him in a trade, rather than crippling their future cap. Don’t buy that. Good teams have an all-star or three. Trading the only all-star on the roster and one of only two top-15-20 players the…

Canoe

Some think Bosh isn’t worth a max deal anyways, so the Raptors should just get whatever they can for him in a trade, rather than crippling their future cap. Don’t buy that. Good teams have an all-star or three. Trading the only all-star on the roster and one of only two top-15-20 players the team has had in its 15-year history because he’ll make too much money is folly.
Perennial all-stars get paid, period. Sure he’s not a LeBron, a Chris Paul or a Wade, but not too many are.
Bosh is not Toronto’s problem. Lack of overall talent is.
The pressure is on Bryan Colangelo now to do something about that or risk having to build around a talent-base that just isn’t good enough.
Andrea Bargnani, Jose Calderon, the ninth pick in this draft and whatever middling pieces a team will give up for an unsigned Bosh won’t get the Raptors anywhere, besides maybe an annual first-round exit.

Fan590

Toronto Raptors superstar forward Chris Bosh joined Hoops to talk about the NBA Finals, the off season, his budding electronic empire and his future in Toronto.

Toronto Sun

As for taking less than a max deal to allow Colangelo to beef up the rest of the lineup, Bosh doesn’t sound like a guy who would consider that.

"An old school guy told me: ‘Take advantage. You can’t play this game forever. Make sure you maximize your potential,’ " Bosh said.

When it was put to Bosh that he was saying no to a hometown discount, Bosh laughed before replying, "In a nice way."

For now, Bosh’s focus is on improving his game.

And this summer, that means hitting the weight room hard and hitting the dinner table often.

Toronto Star

While he set the odds at "good" that he’ll be back in Toronto after next summer – the Raptors, after all, can pay him more than any other team – it’s hardly a guarantee. And so Bryan Colangelo, the general manager, is in the midst of making a tenure-defining read of the tea leaves, to either bank on Bosh re-signing next summer or to engineer an asset-salvaging trade before Bosh leaves for zilch.

Complicating it all is the reality that trading an all-star rarely yields equal value, which is why so many NBA teams give franchise-player contracts to second-tier all-stars. Certainly Bosh, centrepiece of a squad that has won exactly zero playoff series since he arrived, has cemented himself in the latter category. And more and more he comes off as a delusional duper-star. Alert observers still cringe at the season finale in Chicago, when the Texan – needing 18 rebounds to average an even 10 boards a game for the season – pulled down 19 caroms. Too bad his season-high binge came for selfish purposes on the last night of a lost campaign.

National Post

That is not to say Bosh is not critical of his own shortcomings; the four-time all-star is aware that he has hit a certain plateau in his career – as he puts it, "I’ve felt that I’ve been really stagnant." He has grand plans this summer to transform his body, which is still more foal than racehorse.

But Bosh also has a realistic assessment of his value on the National Basketball Association’s open market next summer, and has no plans to compromise that. Ask him if he considers himself a player worthy of a maximum NBA contract, and he does not hesitate.

Binary Basketball

Bosh is currently earning $14,410,581 over 2 years, the same as LeBron, Melo and Wade but will obviously look for more when he’s a free agent. The Knicks will continue to create cap space for the big 2010 class.

But in the mean time Toronto need to try and build a better team around Bosh so he will be convinced to stay with the Raptors, if they don’t do anything to improve the team Bosh will certainly not want to re-sign with the Raptors in 2010.

Detroit Bad Boys

Bosh is unique in that he has the game of a small forward (driving to the hoop, shooting range) in a power forward’s body. Defensively he gets bullied in the post by stronger players like Garnett, Sheed and Howard (but Howard can’t guard Bosh either — Bosh averaged 24/13 on 53% in four games against Orlando this year). Offensively, he’s efficient, but has rarely single-handedly taken over games late.

Barring on-court epiphany similar in magnitude to T-Pain, CB4 is Pau Gasol. If he improves defensively, then maybe Kevin Garnett. Players who are perfect 1A superstars in the league. They will put up mad numbers but for whatever reason, those numbers correlate more with All-Star game appearances than winning and playoff success.

The Knicks Blog

So let’s just say that both Jrue Holiday and Stephen Curry are off the board, and Tyreke Evans is there at 8. With what we now know about Toronto’s love affair, what does Donnie Walsh do?

Does he take Evans and immediately call Toronto and inquire about a possible Lee, (another contract might be necessary depending on what Lee signs for) and Evans for Chris Bosh deal? You’d think that the conversation would take place especially if Walsh somehow acquires a later first round pick. He’d take Evans and sign Lee then look up “C” for “Colangelo.”

Toronto Sun

There was some hysteria over a story or two yesterday that suggested that pending free agent Chris Bosh was finished in this town after next season.

The Raptors star played down the talk last night on The Fan.

He suggested that some people were putting words in his mouth.

"I’d say the odds are good (he would be a Raptor beyond next season)," Bosh said.

"I like it here, that’s what people don’t understand. I like it here … Toronto has treated me well."

Bleacher Report

The Raptors went from Atlantic division champions to squeezing into the playoffs to being a lottery team, and it seems Bosh is the same player throughout.

The only season they truly had success, Bosh not only was not being asked to create, but also not being asked to carry the offense in the clutch; that was TJ Ford’s job.

Therefore, if the Raptors were eliminated in New Jersey, it wasn’t only because Bosh was being stopped by journeymen centers like Mikki Moore and Collins, but because TJ Ford isn’t the type of talent who can successfully carry an offense.

Bleacher Report

In the 2009 draft, the ninth pick is a roll of the dice between any of about ten players.  Some mock drafts have the Raptors taking Jrue Holliday, guard from UCLA, others have them taking Stephen Curry from Davidson or forward Earl Clark from Louisville.  Look for a point guard to be the eventual choice, which one though is anybody’s guess.

So when there is no clear-cut draft pick, what is the GM to do?  He starts making some phone calls around the league to find out how he can improve his team through a trade.

When trying to understand how GM Colangelo would shape them team through trade, we need to look at the needs of the Raptors;

Hoops Addict

17th – Toronto Raptors

Original Pick: Michael Bradley, F, Villanova
New Pick: Kwame Brown, C, High School

I think a major reason that Brown never developed was the pressure of being the top pick in a draft. Combine that with what I’m sure was constant ridicule from Jordan and Brown really had no chance. Send him to Canada to learn to get tough from Antonio Davis, an elder Hakeem Olajuwon and a grinder that was Jerome Williams. You never know…

Celtics 17

Once again, there were rumors during this year’s trade deadline that Stoudemire could be heading to Toronto in exchange for Bosh, but the rumors fell apart hours before the deadline hit (like all others did).
Stoudemire could be the perfect partner with Jose Calderon, who, like current Phoenix Suns point guard Steve Nash, is very effective in the pick-and-roll and open court game, which Stoudemire thrives in.
The Raptors may not immediately become contenders after this move, but they would certainly have a chance of making the playoffs.

Josemanuelcalderon.com

This past May after his return from Canada, José Manuel was assessed by the medical team of the Central Sports Research Unit of the Faculty of Sports Sciences of the University of Castilla-La Mancha.

Jose had an ultrasound and a study of his dynamic muscle function and morphology in order to determine the status of his recent muscular injury and the most appropriate treatment for his recovery. The results of these analyses helped José Manuel to make his decision to renounce his attendance in the European Championship and focus on his recovery throughout the summer.

Khandors Sports Blog

It seems as though a certain segment within Raptorville is, once again, suffering from grotesque “delusions of grandeur”, regarding the actual ability and hoped for improvement of Andrea Bargnani [C, 7-0, 250, 2006 No. 1 Overall Selection] this off-season.

i.e. According to Doug Smith, in a segment on PrimeTime Sports [FAN590] yesterday, a legitimate case can be made that Bargnani might qualify as the 2nd Best Center in the Eastern Conference [EC] over the course of the 2009-2010 season.

Dino Nation Blog

But if you put down your pitch forks and calm down for just a second. If you are the agent for Chris Bosh. Why would you not take this course of action. What happened today is not a ticket out of town for Chris Bosh. In fact in his interview on Hoops he said he likes Toronto and he said that the city has been good to him for 6 years he has been here. Why there is this massive panic to trade Chris Bosh before he leaves has never made any sense to me. It makes even less sense than the stories and comments that T.J Ford was this bad dude that was the problem with the Toronto Raptors. When are people going to chill out and relax about these things. I have read little to nothing positive about the Toronto Raptors since the season ended. A guy that was one of only 3 players in the NBA to record a 20 and 10 season is suddenly not worth having out of fear he is going to walk away? It is crazy.