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Raptors Roll Call Feb 28 vs Rockets

Hard to say we fought hard all game, but we had a shot at the end, which is all you can ask for. Rockets pull it out 88-85 as we land at 10-24.

The “ebb and flow” edition:

Barbosa: nothing makes me sit up and take notice more than when Leandro sees a seam and just attacks it.  In the 1.25 seconds it seems to take him to go from the 3pt line to the hoop, he can take you from being pretty down about this team to revved up.

Bayless: knees up, young fella. Not often you see a ball player get t’d up for kneeing, but in a season full of spin outs, the Raptors will take what they can get to garner some attention.

Calderon: lucky 7’s with 7 points, 7 assists and what seemed to be like 7 different ways of looking like he was stuck in mud while driving a Vespa and having no idea of how to get out.

Carter: the return of the mack to the third PG role tonight. Sexy and memorable? Only to those of you that would also apply, say, Kevin James to those same words.

Davis: overall he still strikes me as the type of guy you work with that leaves the office, goes home, plays WoW, order pizza, plays more WoW, surfs Craigslist posting pictures of himself (but it isn’t really him), stays up all night updating his Plenty of Fish profile, then goes to work the next day high fiving his buddies telling them how he downed almost a keg at the bar last night. He gets a pass after tonight, though.  Didn’t go wild with shot attempts and pulled down 15 boards on a night that, at the half, he had 10 and was already threatening to be the star player we envisioned.

DeRozan: throw it down big fella!!!  Not only did we witness the glory of a DeRozan hammer, but we also witnessed it without Devlin’s atrocious “no props needed” at 100 decibels. DeMar teetered tonight. You could tell he was trying to muster up his inside/outside game, but it never quite got into motion. The fact that it was bubbling under, though, showed be knew what he was supposed to be doing, so I’m looking for a return to glory tomorrow night.

Gray: not an MVP worthy display tonight. Heck, not even a orange-soda-and-a-bag-of-chips display. He looked like a cat with poor eyesight trying to find the bouncy ball in a field of wheat.

A. Johnson: one of those silent yet still affective games from Ameeeer tonight. Nights like this always make me want to refer to his game as Where’s Waldo like, in the sense that he blends in then, all of a sudden, SNAP…there he is!!

J. Johnson: evidently a trip to the barber wasn’t in the cards over the allstar break as he broke out his ode to Olympic-style Vince Carter tonight in the dome department. Seemed to suit him well as he went 16/8 with 3 steals and further evidence that he has settled into his game. No denying that the extra practice time has helped him, but with the regular paced shortened schedule coming up, will he be able to keep it up?

Kleiza: well, the silent assassin was more like full on squirts tonight. Nothing was working for him and he was a poster boy for any ball player coming off a few nights off due to injury running into an all star break: something akin to a Playstation controller on the blink.

Magloire: my least favourite east ender had me ready to eat crow early….then the smile returned to my face after a horrific 3 play sequence which went something like 3 in the key, 3 second defensive violation, then committing a shooting foul at the end of a shot clock violation. It was like a live action flipbook of Jamaal’s Raptor career.

Driving the bus: James Johnson

Under the bus: Linas Kleiza

Theme of the Game: