Toronto Sports

If you visit www.thesaurus.com and search ‘pathetic’, this is what you get.

I’m running out of ways to describe the losses. Since I’ve started this blog, Here are the records of the two teams currently in-season:

Raptors: 0-7

Leafs: 1-2-2

There has been ONE TOTAL WIN. Okay enough, on to the games.

The Raptors stayed in the game until halftime, and then promptly imploded. At least this time they didn’t decide to wait until the last shot of the game to lose, which is a plus. When they were down 17 points with 5 minutes to go in the 4th, I was able to flip channels to see the Leafs, where I was pleasantly surprised to see that we were up 3-2 on the east-leading Bruins. However, I should hae known- if the heartbreaking loss wasn’t to come from the Raptors, it must come from the Leafs. Sure enough, what was once a 3-1 lead evaporated, and the leafs ended up losing 4-3 in a shootout. In all honesty, it was good that the Leafs were in this game at all, and getting a point against Boston shouldn’t be underestimated, but the way they gave up the lead was never-the-less enraging.

TRAFFIC UPDATE

 TORONTO’S A BUNCH OF LOSERS!

Raptors Republic is having a hard time coming up with game recaps, too.

Nathan Jawai Played!

Jose’s coming back!

Damien Cox likes Luke Schenn.

Allstar weekend!

out.

Last night the Toronto Blue Jays held their annual state of the union address for season ticket holders. I was lucky enough to be there, and when not waiting in line for hotdogs or trying to drink as many open bar beers as possible, I listened to a panel of Ricciardi, Beeston, and Gaston (moderated by the great Jerry Howarth) answer fans’ questions about the state of the team.

There really isn’t a hell of a lot to report from this event- the fans want to know why the Jays don’t win, the brass say they’re optimistic, everyone chuckles at Paul Beeston’s wit and then rush to the open bar for the last half hour of service before driving home half in the bag.

A few things of note:

Paul Beeston was decidedly drunk, or at least well on his way. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but I’d think that if I was going to address a group of my biggest supporters and try to explain why this team has underachieved in the past and will likely not be competitive this season, I’d probably put the sauce away until after I was done. Which leads me to my next point—

Not a single member of the panel sounded truly optimistic about this year’s team. While they didn’t go so far as to outright say ‘this is a rebuilding year, we won’t be very good, but we promise to be better later’, they all but said it in their over-arching ambiguously positive statements. The only person who said anything optimistic about this year’s Jays was a wasted Paul Beeston. Beeston has “just got a feeling” about this season being a good one. Now if that wasn’t insulting enough, he went on a tangent about a glut of pitching, and how we can maybe move some of those pieces for a big bat. Yeah, we’re real deep in our rotation, a rotation that might be starting Scott Richmond this year.

Taking a note out of Bryan Colangelo’s book, apparently J.P. is looking outside the MLB for some pitching help, speaking with a nameless pacific rim pitcher and a nameless Japanese pitcher. Since we know that all Japanese people love baseball and are in faact very very good at it, this is very exciting news!

When asked about player projections, Cito Gaston also sounded drunk. He said of Lyle Overbay thathe expected 20+ home runs and 90 RBIs. Lyle has gone over 20 HRs once, and over 90 RBIs once, so Cito sees a career year for the 32 year old Overbay. Cito also Projected Rios to have over 30 HRs this year and 100+ RBIs. Rios’ career highs: 24 HRs, 85 RBIs. Cito also noted, when asked about Rios’ hitting prowess “he has big hands. He comes to give the fist pump in the dugout, and I just put my hand up now cause I’ve got a couple sore knuckles”. Oh- and red-hot Scotty Ro-Ho is expected to pop 25-30 dingers this year while staying healthy and owning the 3rd base line.

GO JAYS GO!

The drunks have a report on Wilner’s report , and a hate-on for Ricciardi loving his family.

Morgan Campbell reports basically the same thing as above, although with more class and journalistic integrity.

Oscar Wilde once said “To expect the unexpected shows a thoroughly modern intellect”. Well, move over Sartre. The Toronto Raptors fan base has become the most contemporary group of thinkers of all time. When the Raps were up 1 with 35 seconds to go and possession, who amongst us truly believed that they would win the game? Now, granted, none of us would have imagined the spectacular fashion in which Jamario Moon would shit all over both ends of the court, but nonetheless we knew that somehow, some way, the Raptors would lose this game. And that’s really what it comes down to. There are teams that find a way to win, and teams that find a way to lose. The line between the two is a thin one. A shot here, a rebound there, and the raptors could be on a 5 game winning streak instead of a 6 game losing streak. But the point is that they consistently do not make that shot, or grab that board. So now, we start to see the seams splitting. Bosh getting in Jamario’s face, Jamario defending his asinine shot in the post game interview, and the head coach taking sides. The frustration is palpable by the team and its fanbase, the season is slipping away in a hurry, but there’s no quick fix or easy answer. The team has to keep doing what it’s doing, only working harder and playing smarter.

Oh- and the leafs lost too.

TRAFFIC UPDATE

There’s a bunch of good stuff at www.Raptorblog.com, including a meditation on the trade value of CB4, and a well deserved hate-on for Chuck Swirsky.

The Republic’s got a great game breakdown, as does Doug Smith .

Tonight, the Jays brass faces the fans , and the drunks are a little cheesed.

The World Baseball Classic rosters were announced, and Canada is a little thin at pitching.

Damien Cox is pissed about the World Cup of Hockey happening in 2011.

 Ben Knight’s not sold on TFC’s decision to keep all 3 first round picks.

In the words of Young Jeezy, ‘My president is Black, my Lambo’s blue, and I’ll be goddamned if my rims ain’t too’

Let’s say it together, Leafs, Raps, Jays, and TFC fans: YES WE CAN! (althoug realistically, we probably can’t.)

This afternoon, the Raps lost in devastatingly soul-mangling fashion, 117-113. Apparently no one told ‘defense’ that the game started at 12:30. There were 70 POINTS scored in the first quarter alone, and 134 scored in the first half. Toronto hung around all game, rallying from double-digit deficits to tie the game up 102-102 in the 4th quarter and ultimately getting themselves in the following situation: down 3 points, 12.4 seconds left, inbounding the ball at half court. Now if this was any other team than the Toronto Raptors, you woud assume the following would happen: The ball would get into the hands of one of the two players on your team who are capable of making 3-pointers (and were a combined 6-9 from three), Anthony Parker or Jamario Moon and have tem jack up a 3.

That didn’t happen.

While A.P. did get the ball, he drove off a pick & roll at the top of the key and missed an open layup, then bosh missed the put-back, and there’s your ballgame. As it turns out, Traino wanted the 2, and the quick foul. ‘12 seconds is a long time and I still had 2 time outs’ was what he said at the post-game confrence. Now I’m not a head coach in the NBA, but I take my chances with a 3 at the buzzer. If you take the quick 2, more often than not, 4 seconds tick off the clock (generously) and then the ball ends up in Steve Nash’s hands, a guy who just doesn’t miss free throws, and then here’s your scenario: 8 seconds left, down by 3, inbounding from your own baseline. Those 4 seconds now wasted, you’re forced to rush down the court and settle for ANY 3. If I’m wrong, please tell me, but that play doesn’t seem to make sense to me.

All of this adds up to another horribly painful loss for the raptors and their fans. There have been an inordinate number of losses like this one for the raps to endure this year, and they never seem to get any easier.

A few points:

A.P. started at the point today, and he played pretty well. The offense certainly felt better than it does under either Solomon or Ukic. That probably has something to do with Parker and company shooting the lights out, but I liked the change.

Joey Graham had an great game. He was moving without the ball, creating shots, and pulling up with confidence.

There was a stretch of about 45 seconds in the 2nd quarter where Triano decided to rest graham, bosh & bargnani. That left: solomon, voshkul, humphries, parker, and moon on the court. They had two unbelievably stagnant offensive sets and gave up 4 quick points, making it a 9 point game for phoenix before Triano put Bosh & Bargnani back in. That potential 8 point swing ended up really hooping the raptor, and for what? an extra 2 minutes of rest going into a 20 minute halftime break? Seems a little silly to me, and it just may have cost the Raptors the game.

Nothing enrages me more than seeing people start filing out of the arena with 2 minutes left in the 4th quarter of a great, close game. Why did you come if you aren’t going to stay to watch when the game gets interesting? In conclusion, if this sounds like you, instead of going to the game, give me your tickets. I like basketball and I promise to stay to the very end.

Jermaine O’Neal and Kapono weren’t on the bench. Apparently the J.O.  for Marion & Banks deal is almost done , so that might have something to do with his absence, but Kapono missed the game with the ‘flu’. Sounds fishy, but I haven’t heard anything to substantiate this random rumour mongering.

Alright that’s it. NFL football is on.

It’s not a good time to be a sports fan in Toronto at the moment.

First of all, it’s -76 outside. There are a number of reasons that I don’t live in Winnipeg, and somewhere on the list is the fact that leaving your house is tantamount to walking into freezer. A freezer with devastating windchill.

For the second night in a row, the leafs frittered away a huge lead in the 3rd period. This time, however, we went all the way, blowing a 3-goal lead in the 3rd and then losing it with a minute and a half left in overtime. If it wasn’t for the absolutely retarded scoring system of the NHL, the leafs would have come away empty handed, and deservedly so. It was an unbelievably atrocious display. I wonder if Burke’ll loosen his stance on never asking players to remove their no trade clauses.

The Raptors lost last night to the now 15-25 Indiana Pacers, and did so in absurd, Raptor fashion. The raps went into the 4th quarter trailing by TWENTY FOUR, but somehow miraculously cut the lead to one point, only to have Mike Dunleavy get Bosh to jump on his pump fake from the THREE POINT LINE (?!?!?!) getting the foul and making the free throws, essentially icing the loss. To the PACERS. J.O. came off the bench and was ineffective. He played 17 minutes and didn’t make a shot, finishing with 2 points and 7 boards. He also spent the 4th quarter icing his knees on the sideline.

Highlight of the game: On TSN they have one of those in-game trivia things: ‘did you know’, where they profile a certain Raptor player and give some fun anecdotal information about him. In this case, it was Jermaine O’Neal. Did you know that he has a recording studio? Did you know that his favourite artist is Biggie? This sent Jack off on a tangent, and he rattled on about how he wanted to go see the studio. Then he kicked things up a notch, saying that he wanted to record something in the studio, and that he wanted a recording contract. Then, the conversation went something like this.

Jack: I want a recording contract! I’ll record a song with Biggie!
Matt: You want to record with Bigg- well, I don’t think you can do that as he’s not with us any more.
Jack: [getting very excited] Then I’ll record one with Tiny!

The play begins at this point. Matt Devlin struggles valiantly.

Matt: Yes, Biggie Smalls, the… Notorious B.I.G., he—ohhh boy.

That ‘Oh Boy’ was my favourite moment from last night’s game. It was so defeated, a kind of acknowledgement that you’re not getting out of this one and you should just cut your losses.

Speaking of cutting one’s losses (see that? see what just happened?) the Heat are apparently interested in Jermaine O’Neal, with a deal to bring Shawn Marion (and a bit more) to T.O. If Colangelo can get this deal, I would do it in a second. Marion’s 17.1 million dollar contract is done after this season, so even in a worst-case scenario, Marion comes in and sucks bag all year, or he’s unhappy in Canada / not being’the guy’, he’s done after this year anyways.

On the TFC front, ESPNsoccernet has a breakdown of all the 1st round selections , inluding, obviously, TFC’s 3 choices. It feels like a couple of these picks will no longer be with the club once they start the season, but we’ll see. Mo’s obviously not shy to pull the trigger.

TONIGHT

The Toronto Rock host the Calgary Hitmen @ 7 at the ACC. Not televised.

So a lot has gone down in the last 24 hours. So, sport-by-sport, here we go.

HOCKEY

The leafs won 6-4 last night, led by Jason Blake’s ‘eat shit Paul Maurice’ 5 points. Puck Daddy says he was last night’s first star. Also, in case you haven’t heard, Paul Maurice spoke to a Carolina radio station and said he wished the leafs lose every game for the next ten years. This is the kind of thing that made me like Maurice when he was coaching here, and the very thing that inspires hateful vengeance now that he’s not.

The leafs play the Thrashers tonight at 7:30. A winnable game, as long as Wilson finds something new about his players to make fun of.

BASKETBALL

Jermaine O’Neal comes back in time to face his old team when the raps play the pacers tonight. He’s saying all of the right things about coming off the bench for now, but we’ll see how long that holds up. Jose is travelling with the team, but he’s not planning on playing tonight. Cuzoogle has a better and more intense game preview. 

Scott Carefoot over at raptorblog.com is under the weather but found the strength to post a few links. There’s a great one that I read in today’s globe about the rising popularity of basketball in Canada.

BASEBALL

Former Jays catcher Greg Zaun signed a 1 year deal with Baltimore with a second year team option. I always liked Zaunie and I wish him the best of luck with trying to enjoy himself in the shithole that is Baltimore, playing on a last place team.

SOCCER

The MLS Superdraft (Note: What makes it so ’super’? Why not just ‘draft’) went a little differently than anticipated. They did grab White, but they also grabbed quality midfielder Sam Cronin. mlsdraft.net thinks that it’s simply for trade bait, but for now he’s a red. They also nabbed quality goalkeeper Stephan Frei.  Ultimately, there seems to be a lot hinging on White’s busted-ass knee healing to see if this draft was a success or not.

CANADIAN FOOTBALL

The Argos ‘got their guy’, a guy no one’s ever heard of. Bart Andrus is the new head of the double blue, coming over from being a tennessee titans assistant offensive coach. What does that job entail, exactly? I guess there’s coffee to be drank and waterbottles to be filled. In all seriousness this guy’s apparently a pretty good offensive mind, so maybe- just maybe- it will make the CFL interesting.

TV TONIGHT

Leafs @ Thrashers 7:30, Sportsnet Ontario

Raptors @ Pacers 7 PM TSN

The MLS Superdraft goes this afternoon at 2 PM EST.

Toronto FC holds three first round picks: 2, 4, and 13. While Mo is recieving a lot of calls, he’s yet to swing any deals.

Because I don’t know much about college soccer prospects, I’ll defer to www.mlsdraft.net for insight on these players. Here, I will judge them based on their pictures.

2. Peri Marosevic:

This guy is clearly an asshole. As you can see from the styling of his hair, he clearly has a ‘faux-hawk’, and that faux-hawk is bleached blonde. While this haircut clearly makes you an asshole, it also seems to be a very important factor in being a great soccer player. I predict that this former wolverine will have a great career in the mls for one to two seasons before being transferred to some bottom of the table premier league team (I say…sunderland) only to come off the bench. His career will be tragically cut short when he is found drunk on Bellinis, suffocated by the tightness of his ‘affliction’ t-shirt.

4. Steve Zakuani

There’s a footballer for you. Spent some time in the Arsenal camp, then came over to Akron. He apparently can score, which is good, and he’s english, which is really good, for as we all know, Europeans are inherently better soccer players than North Americans. (Dwayne who?) With that in mind, Zakuani will be TFC’s leading scorer this season, and will be the MVP of the league. He will have a chant in his honor by the fourth game (and his third hat trick) of the season.

13. O’Brian White

Ahh, O’Brien, a nice Irish lad h— he’s what? Canadian? Huh. White is the only one of these three of whom I know. He’s a quick, powerful striker, but his ACL is fucked up, so he’s more than a bit of a risk. This is a risk TFC should take though- they need someone who can finish up front, as that’s something they’ve yet to really have in their long and storied history.

Qu’est-ce que vous chantez?

Derrick Rose had 25 points and 10 assists in beating the raptors 102-98 Wednesday night in Toronto. After playing an absolutely terrible first quarter, the Raps woke up and played a pretty decent game. (A game I had to go to a bar to see, as it was on TSN2.) Andrea Bargnani continued his stellar run since starting, scoring a career high 31 points on 10-14 shooting, and Chris Bosh contributed 25 points of his own. Unfortunately, with the game on the line, Bosh had his shot rejected by Noah on what looked like a broken play, sealing the Bulls’ victory.

A few notes: On that final play, coming out of the time out, it looked as though the play call was for a Kapono jumper. While that may not have been my choice of play to run, I’m okay with the call. Apparently  no one asked Jason Kapono though, as he seemed simply unwilling to take the open shot, instead deciding to look inside to a Bosh iso on Noah. Which brings me to my next point. Bosh’s post moves are becoming a little predictable. As Noah said after the game, “I knew he was going to try to pump fake because he pump fakes a lot.” Bosh’s go-to in the post has turned into a pump-fake fade away jumper. Especially late in games, he seems to rely on his jump shot when, in my opinion, he should pump fake and then step in, as opposed to away, giving you a higher percentage look and opportunities for the foul call, or grabbing some boards. Which brings me to my next point:

Why didn’t Bargnani get a touch on the last posession of the game??? I understand that Bosh is the franchise, and he wants the ball in his hands at crunch time, but a simple glance over to Bosh’s and Barg’s stat line shows that Andrea was shooting the lights out all game, going 10-14 from the field, while Bosh went 8-18. Taking the higher percentage shot in this case, would be going with Andrea. Now I’m not saying that Andrea is better than Bosh, and ultimately it’s hard to complain when Bosh gets the ball with a chance to tie/win the game, but complain I will. Go with the hot hand, go with the guy who’s only missed 4 shots all game and has been playing out of his mind since you’ve shown him some trust- maybe you should show him a little more and see what he can do.

2 more things: Why the fuck is Will Solomon starting, and for fuck’s sake why is he on the court in crunch time? The offense is stalling out all over the place as Solomon is picking up his dribble with 20 seconds on the shot clock, etc. I want Roko starting, developing, and learning, because he’s still young and still able to learn, as opposed to Will, who is who he is, and doesn’t have a hell of a lot of upside.

Finally, on a good note, the Swirsk was back in town as the Bulls radio play-by-play guy. He was given a well deserved warm reception, and it was great to see him. Say what you will about his commentary, but he energized the Raptors fan base the way that no other radio or T.V. personality has, and that in itself is a hell of an accomplishment.

Leafs lost again last night, 2-0 to Nashville. The managed a paltry 17 shots on net, a season worst. Word on the street is that Ron Wilson, desperately scrambling for a new way to motive his team, has called a closed door meeting with all of the players’ wives and girlfriends to tell them how much better a lover he is than what they’re getting. (NOTE: When googling ‘Ron Wilson’, this dude comes up  the first page. The real Ron Wilson, ladies and gentlemen.

In what’s not really news, Kaberle says he still wants to play with the Maple Leafs.  The best part of this, however, is Burke’s stance on never asking a player to remove his no trade clause. So let’s hope Kaberle mans up and does Burke’s job for him by stepping into his office and writing his own ticket out.

On to the links.

Howard Berger speculates about Vesa Toskala’s future with the Leafs, including wetting the collective pants of Leaf Nation with the mention of nabbing FA Niklas Backstrom after this season.

 Mike Wilner talks HOF, compares Rice to Dante Bichette.

Jack Armstrong likes what he sees out of Il Mago, and

Scott Carefoot over at Raptorblog.com expresses a more tempered optimism about Bargnani.

Seems to be a relatively quiet day on the ol’ cyberweb. Here’s what’s on tonight:

Bulls@ Raptors, 7 PM on TSN2

For those of you in the GTA with Rogers cable, that means that nothing’s on, because rogers doesn’t want to see sportsnet get trumped by yet another higher quality sports network with better programming and better organization.

Maybe you should just stay in tonight and read about the debacle that is Eddy Curry’s life.

Sam Smith at Bulls.com thinks Steve Nash could be en route to Toronto.

Here’s the deal: Nash, Leandro Barbosa and Robin Lopez for Jose Calderon, Andrea Bargnani, Anthony Parker and Jason Kopono and maybe Jamario Moon.

I love the idea of having Barbosa playing 2/3 for us, but I’m not sure how I feel about this deal, especially when you consider how well Bargnani’s been playing recently. Couple that with Nash’s age and back issues, and this deal makes us older and more injury prone at a time when we need to be getting younger and healthier, as the raps aren’t going to win the championship this year.

So I guess I know exactly how I feel about this deal. I love Steve Nash and I think it would be great to see him in a Raptor uniform, and I think having Barbosa makes the Raptors a much better, more well rounded team, however I think the cost, at this point, is too high.