Ah…this feels familiar. After months of winning, and a season that saw the Toronto Raptors jump out to an Eastern Conference leading record of 24-7, Toronto has hit a serious speedbump. Now? Toronto lost five in a row prior to their win last night in Philadelphia, and struggled through a February that ended as their first month without a winning record since Rudy Gay was shipped out.
4-6…February was not kind to Toronto. February saw four games where Toronto scored less than 90 points (only one was a win), a game where the Raptors were absolutely destroyed by Golden State, and a pathetic showing to a New York Knicks team that started a frontcourt of Lou Amundson and Andrea Bargnani.
Outside of a narrow victory against the San Antonio Spurs, and a blowout of the Atlanta Hawks, the Raptors must be thrilled to see the calendar flip over to March.
And it all felt familiar. Winning early in the season was amazing, but after 20 years of mostly losing efforts it felt rather foreign. Most fans, myself often included, seemed to be constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop. Something had to eventually go wrong. After all, they’re the Raptors.
So much is going wrong as of late for the Raptors that it’s tough to narrow down what exactly the root of the problem is. Just as when it was all going so well earlier in the year it was tough to point toward any one thing the Raptors were doing so well.
The truth of the matter is that the Raptors aren’t the team that blew away the competition early in the year, just as they aren’t the team that can’t seem to buy a bucket as of late. What they are is likely somewhere in the middle.
Despite the recent string of loses, Toronto is still on pace for a franchise record 52 wins, has the fourth highest rated offense in the NBA, and has a 12 game lead on Brooklyn for the Atlantic Division.
Life could be worse….it could also be better at the moment…but it could be a lot worse.
After all, outside of Cleveland, Atlanta, and seemingly Indiana (I love Frank Vogel), every team currently in the Eastern Conference playoff picture has its own set of problems.
The Chicago Bulls have lost Derrick Rose to another knee surgery, and as of yesterday have lost Jimmy Butler for 3-6 weeks due to an elbow sprain. We can now expect to see heavy minutes from players like Kirk Hinrich.
Washington is still missing Bradley Beal and was one of several teams to have a worse February than Toronto, finishing the month with a record of just 3-9.
The Milwaukee Bucks are trying to incorporate a new starting point guard in Michael Carter-Williams after trading Brandon Knight for him at the deadline, had to go through a difficult process recently with Larry Sanders, are missing Jabari Parker for the season, and list Jared Dudley and O.J. Mayo as day-to-day.
The Heat will be without the services of Chris Bosh for the remainder of the season due to blood clots in his lungs, have Josh McRoberts sidelined due to knee surgery, and trade deadline acquisition Goran Dragic is dealing with a troublesome back issue.
Basically, life currently sucks for almost everyone in the Eastern conference playoff picture, and for many of these teams life sucks more than it does for Toronto.
Small level of comfort in that, but it’s true. Toronto isn’t dealing with any serious injuries (assuming Kyle Lowry is truly day-to-day), is not trying to fit any new players into their system, is seeing considerable development from Jonas Valanciunas as of late, and is still on pace for the best season in franchise history.
Life as a Raptors fan has historically not been kind, but let’s try to accept this current stretch as a mere blip on the radar that can be worked through.
The history of the franchise makes it seem like the sky is falling whenever the team enters into a small losing streak, but in reality it’s just a raining at the moment. The Raptors still have 22 games to get things sorted before the playoffs; let’s hope the clouds part before April.
