Yes, because four game in is the time to panic.

http://www.hoopsworld.com/Story.asp?story_id=14224

It’s amazing how quickly the sky starts to fall sometimes. The Toronto Raptors started the 2009-10 season with a bang, defeating the Cleveland Cavaliers, but are 0-2 since then after losses to Orlando and Memphis. An early scapegoat seems to be rookie shooting guard DeMar DeRozan, who has been starting and is averaging just 7.3 points per game.

Who the hell is blaming DeMar DeRozan for anything in Toronto?

It’s a sum of the peices and our peices don’t work! I’m not trying to say they are awful. The Raptors could very well win 45 games with this line up but I will say it one more time. NO TEAM WITH BARGS at Center, Bosh at PF and Calderon at PG will ever be a title contender. EVER! It doesn’t matter who the other 2 players are. They could get LeBron and Wade and it won’t matter. If you can’t guard the point and the interior your never going to be elite.

So why do we keep going in this direction? Brian Colangelo isn’t aware that the basketball court has 2 ends!

He envisioned this team with Calderon and Bosh running screen roll with Parker, Bargnani and Kapono around the perimeter and everybody giggled in excitement!!!!

BC after the first game of the season… Oh no! They have to play the other end too! I though if you scored you kept the ball? No! This is a mess! Maybe if we just keep playing Bargnani at Center and then give him 50 million the fans won’t realize I’m a fraud? Oh no…Mark is on to us!

Rap of the Day!

IT’S ONLY BEEN THREE GAMES!!!!!!

There’s nine new players, a tough schedule….this was expected!!! I suspect some of you are leafs fans and are bringing the same sense of urgency/worry to basketball….please keep that stuff away from the raps. Thanks!

Calderon needs to be that secondary ball handler, and hit open shots…and if you do that, then why bother with him on the floor? Use Jack for his defense.

Frustrating.

No 1 player is the issue in Toronto. We have good players. The problem is we spend so much time finding guys who fit on offense we forget that there are 2 ends to the court. I have often said Bargs and Bosh don’t fit well together. THEY DON’T! However, is it impossible to win with them YES! But you need Rondo, Raja Bell and Gerald Wallace guarding the perimeter to make sure they aren’t required to block shots or help while guarding Dwight Howard.

The farmer doen’t protect his daughter by leaving the barn door open with her legs tied up in the air! Our personal will never be good on defense…..EVER!!!!

Either Bosh or Bargnani need to go OR Calderon needs to go because the combination doesn’t work, shouldn’t work and never should have been considered.

Tell me I’m wrong. Show me a team with poor interior defense and no perimeter defense that has one any games. Don’t say Pheonix! Because they had perimeter defense out the ying yang with Bell, Joe Johnson and Marion who is also that big 3 that plays like a 4 which is crucial to having 2 finesse bigs.

I’m done….

The problem is that Bargnani hasn’t been very good at guarding the low post, either. Just about every time Howard posted him up, he scored (Bosh did a fantastic job on Howard, on the other hand). Plus, his rotations on defense are late, his play defending the pick and roll is horrible, and while he’s certainly not adequate guarding perimeter players like Anderson, what really bugged me was that he wouldn’t even get his hands up when trying to close out. You’re seven-frickin’ feet tall, get your hands up at the very least!!!!! This bugs me when I’m playing pickup ball, I can’t imagine a pro doing it. It’s basic fundamental basketball.

Arse, your take on Bargnani in that Orlando game was spot on, but I think you need to recognize that Andrea is nor will he ever by even adequate guarding players like Ryan Anderson. Like you pointed out, he is an adequate low post defender, which is all the Raps should ask him to do. His offense is too valuable to leave off the floor, the guy is averaging 22 pts a game!

The entire Raptors offense should be side pick and roll with Hedo and Bosh and high pick and pop with Hedo and Bargnani. Jose is frustrating me to no end. His ridiculous need for the ball is imploding the Raptor offense. Bosh, Hedo, Bargnani is giving this Raptors squad 65 pts a night, that should be good enough, yet its not even close. I am perplexed.

Neither is an All-Star and the move is garbage.

Let’s chill on defensive talk, because the reality is this team is never going to be great defensively with its current roster. We really only have 3 or 4 guys that can play D. Don’t expect the team to become defensive specialists. Triano keeps talking about improving it because thats the reason they will lose this season. So they have to get better to win.

To me it really looks the effort is just not there.

We need Evans back give him shots and get him in the damn game.

You’re right though, we can’t really expect it all to click when even the coach is asking/saying that it will take some time for everything to fall into place.