That story about O’Neal going hard at Bargnani in Vegas over the summer is true. O’Neal was impressed by Bargnani’s resilience and toughness in the workouts and came away with a good impression of the youngster. I know, its still very early but it’s something to build on. The deviated septum surgery he had done should help him because by Bargnani’s own admission he says that it was a “problem” last year. Hopefully that’s the end of the mouth-breathing. If you were wondering where Bargnani was over the summer (when not in Vegas), he was in Treviso, Italy:
The Raptors set up a strict off-season program for Bargnani, that included the training he did with O’Neal in Las Vegas, and several weeks working out in Treviso, Italy, all under the careful watch of Toronto’s coaching staff.
Good stuff. I can’t wait to see the results and do expect him to get significantly better. On the other hand, Gord Herbert warns us that he’s still a work in progress. Whatever it be, they’re saying that the results of the off-season are actually showing up in training camp which makes me a little happy. You can check out his interview with Devlin here.
Mitchell’s won’t be going hard on the players in training camp and will spread out the pain. He doesn’t want to over-work them in October. Fine by me. He’s also not worried about the mistakes they’re making in camp so far. Also fine by me. Roko Ukic is the only one who hasn’t been through a training camp so we’ve go to hand-hold him a little but everybody else knows what they’re doing and are pacing themselves accordingly. I just don’t want the Raptors to coast this pre-season like they did last year, I’ll once again point out the Celtics example from last year. Those guys were playing HAARRD in pre-season and wanted to win every game and get off to a great start even in pre-season. That’s the attitude this team needs to adopt.
The loss of Orlando left a bitter taste in everyone’s mouth and the only mouthwash for it is success that comes early and often. This team is lacking confidence right now, the acquisition of O’Neal might add some swagger to the team but deep down it’s still a squad that’s gotten too used to a first-round exit. I’d like the Raptors to put up a slogan in the training camp facility: Orlando humiliated us. That should serve as plenty motivation for everybody. My point is that although I fully agree with Mitchell about taking precautions in camp, I don’t want it to get lost on the players that they have a tremendous amount of pride to restore and things to prove and the way you start doing that is going all-out from media day onwards.
Matt Devlin is bringing up the possibility of Sam Mitchell starting Jason Kapon instead of Anthony Parker. I disagree here, Parker provides a good-enough perimeter threat already and has a well-rounded offensive game. It`s like robbing Peter to pay Paul. In the end you`re replacing a shooter with a shooter which has very little net gain.
Bad news already for the Knicks. Jeffries broke is leg. Ouch.
